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Proclus’ Metaphysical Elements
Thomas M. Johnson, Translator
“Virtuous, therefore, is the man who relieves the corporeal wants of others, who wipes away the tear of sorrow, and gives agony repose; but more virtuous he who, by disseminating wisdom, expels ignorance from the soul, and thus benefits the immortal part of man. For it may indeed be truly said, that he who has not even a knowledge of common things is a brute among men; that he who has an accurate knowledge of human concerns alone is a man among brutes; but that he who knows all that can be known by intellectual energy is a God among men.”
Introduction
Proclus, the famous philosopher, mathematician and poet, came into the world of time and sense on the 8th day of February, A.D. 410, at Byzantium, and migrated from this physical life on April the 17th, 485 A.D.
1 The following sketch of Proclus is taken almost verbatim from Marinus’ Life of his Master. This biography is an admirable production, and gives us much curious and interesting in formation about the philosophic life of the Successors of Plato. It is unfortunate that Taylor’s English version of it is practically inaccessible. (It was printed in 1792.) The original text was edited by Fabricius, Hamburg, 1700, Lond., 1703; by Boissonade, Leip. 1814, and in the Cobet edition of Diogenes Laertius, Paris, 1850; and by Cousin, in his Procli Opera Inedita, Paris, 1864.
On one occasion, after hearing a lecture by Olympiodorus, a man who was gifted with much
2 This truly great man appears to have been the first who thoroughly penetrated the profundity contained in the writings of the more ancient philosophers, contemporary with and prior to Plato, and to have demonstrated the admirable agreement of their doctrines with each other. Unfortunately but few of his works are extant.–Taylor.
3 Aristotle’s philosophy when compared with the discipline of Plato is, I think, deservedly considered in this place as bearing the relation of the proteleia to the epopteia in sacred mysteries. Now the proteleia, i.e. things previous to perfection, belong to the initiated, and the mystics; the former of whom were introduced into some lighter ceremonies only, but the mystics were permitted to be present with certain preliminary and lesser sacred concerns. On the other hand the epoptae were admitted into the sanctuary of the greater sacred rites, and became spectators of the symbols and more interior ceremonies. Aristotle indeed appears to be everywhere an enemy to the doctrine of ideas, as understood by Plato, though they are doubtless the leading stars of all true philosophy. However the great excellence of his works, considered as an introduction to the divine theology of Plato, deserves the most unbounded commendation. Agreeable to this Damascius informs us that Isidorus the philosopher, “grasped only slightly the rhetorical and poetical arts, but devoted himself to the more divine philosophy of Aristotle. Discovering, however, that this was based more on necessary reasons than intuitive intellect, that the procedure by method was deemed sufficient, and that it did not entirely employ a divine or intellectual insight, he was but little solicitous about his doctrine. But when he tasted the conceptions of Plato, he did not think it worth while “to look any further,” as Pindar says 4 , but expecting to gain his desired end if he could penetrate into the adyta * of Plato’s thought, he therefore directed to this purpose the whole course of his application. Of the most ancient philosophers, he deified Pythagoras and Plato, believing that they were among those winged souls which in the supercelestial place, in the plain of Truth, and in the meadow there, are nourished by divine ideas.” (Photii Bibliotheca, p. 337. Vol. II. ed. Bekker.)-Taylor.
4 Olymp. I. 183. Additional Note: The form of the foregoing note has been changed somewhat, and the quotation from Damascius extended. This note was written in 1792: Taylor’s mature conclusion was, that the opposition of Aristotle to the Platonic doctrines, even to that of Ideas, was purely apparent. “He strenuously maintained that Aristotle was not only the pupil but in the strictest sense the holder of the Platonic dogmas; contrary to the ignorant and rash deductions of the moderns, who had never fully comprehended either master or pupil.”
* Adyta: The innermost sanctuary of an ancient Greek temple, restricted to priests and not accessible to the general public.
5 The narthex (wand or thrysus) is a symbol of material and partible fabrication, because it has as it were a false form: for it is wood and not wood. More rightly is it so called on account of its sundered continuity, whence it is likewise a Titanic plant. For they hold it before Dionysus (Bacchus) instead of his paternal sceptre, and through this they call him into a partible nature. Moreover, the Titans are wand or thyrsus-bearers; and Prometheus concealed fire in a reed, by which we may understand either that he draws down celestial light into generation, or leads the soul into body, or calls forth divine illumination, the whole of which is ungenerated, into generation. Hence Socrates Orphically calls the multitude thyrsus-bearers, because they live Titanically.–Olympiodorus: Commentary on the Phaedo, p. 96, (ed. Finckh, Heilbron. 1847).
he was divinely inspired about the
6 Doubtless the fashionable philosophasters of this materialistic age will shake their empty heads over the intellectual training of Proclus and brand it as “mystical,” but since the opinion of these sapient gentlemen arises from ignorance and incapacity it will not disturb those whose thought ranges beyond the barriers of sense and matter.
At the same time, investigating the writings of the Ancients, whatever he found in them genuine he judiciously adopted, but every thing
Lo! on my soul a sacred fire descends,
Whose vivid power the intellect extends;
From whence far beaming thro’ dull body’s night,
It soars to aether deck’d with starry light;
And with soft murmurs thro’ the azure round,
The lucid regions of the Gods resound.
Moreover, he clearly perceived that he belonged to the Hermetic chain; and was persuaded by a dream that he possessed the soul of Nicomachus the Pythagorean. [
7 No opinion is more celebrated than that of the metempsychosis of Pythagoras, but perhaps no doctrine is more generally mistaken. By must of the present day it is exploded as ridiculous; and the few who retain some veneration for its founder endeavor to destroy the literal, and to confine it to an allegorical meaning. By some of the ancients this mutation was limited to similar bodies; so that they conceived the human soul might transmigrate into various human bodies, but not into those of brutes. And this was the opinion of Hierocles, as may be seen in his Commentary on the Golden Verses. But why may not the human soul become connected with subordinate, as well as with superior lives, by a tendency of inclination? Do not similars love to be united; and is there not in all kinds of life something similar and common? Hence when the affections of the soul verge to a baser nature, while connected with a human body, these affections, on the dissolution of such a body, become enveloped as it were in a brutal nature, and the rational eye in this case clouded with perturbations is oppressed by the irrational energies of the brute, and surveys nothing but the dark phantasms of a degraded imagination. But this doctrine is vindicated by Proclus, with his usual acuteness, in his admirable Commentaries on the Timaeus, Lib. 5. p. 329, [Vol. III. p. 294. ed. Diehl], as follows: “It is usual to inquire how human souls can descend into brute animals. And some indeed think that there are certain similitudes of men to brutes, which they call brutal lives: for it is not possible that a rational essence can become the soul of a brute. But others allow that it may be immediately sent into irrational animals, because all souls are of a similar form; so that they may become wolves and leopards and mollusca. But true reason indeed asserts that the human soul may enter into brutes, yet in such a manner that it may retain its own proper life; the soul riding as it were on and bound by sympathy to the brutal nature. And that this is the only mode of insinuation we have proved by a multitude of arguments, in our Commentaries on the Phaedrus. If however it be requisite to remind the reader that this is the opinion of Plato, we may observe that in his Republic he says that the soul of Thersites assumed the nature of an ape, but not the body of an ape; and in the Phaedrus that the soul descends into a brutal life, but not into a brutal body. For the life is conjoined to its proper soul. And in this place he says that it ‘is changed into a brutal nature.’ For a brutal nature is not a brutal body, but a brutal life.”–Taylor.
Ammonius Hermeiae, a genuine Platonist and likewise
These eulogies, which may seem extravagant to those who know Proclus, if at all, only through the average historian of Philosophy, are in my deliberate judgment, a judgment formed after a study of many years of the writings of Proclus, based on the truth.
Proclus was unquestionably one of the greatest philosophers of any age or country. His authority was
9 De La Phil. Scol. 1. 389.
It would be superfluous to enumerate the names of all the thinkers who were nurtured by his philosophic conceptions, but a few may be mentioned. The writings of Pseudo-Dionysius the Areopagite, which profoundly inspired and influenced Christian thought for many centuries, owe much to Proclus. Generally, and particularly in his treatise On the Divine Names, Dionysius borrowed extensively from him. The hierarchies of Dionysius are modelled on the different orders of the “gods” (θεοι) which are divine natures, essences or forces, of varying power and rank.
During the Renaissance Proclus, made known to the Latin world by the translations of divers of his
In Modern times the influence of Proclus has not diminished. Many distinguished scholars and thinkers, though in all cases not directly, have been stimulated or inspired by his thought. Hegel, for instance, studied Proclus deeply, and was largely indebted to him. He gave special attention to the Elements, as is evidenced by his correspondence with Creuzer on the text.
If the reader wishes to ascertain what the character of Proclus was not, and to get a travesty of his philosophy. he may peruse “Alexandria and Her Schools” by Charles Kingsley, one of the blind leaders of the blind in philosophical science, a gentleman who was in the habit of vilifying whatever he did not understand, and who was no more qualified to explain or criticize what he termed “Neo-Platonism” than an Esquimo.
10 William of Moerbeke, Archbishop of Corinth, who flourished in the 13th century, translated from the Greek into Latin several books of Proclus, among which was the Metaphysical Elements. He records that he finished his translation of the Elements on the 18th day of May, 1268, at Viterbo, Italy. This is extant in Ms., but has never been printed. A Ms. Espositio of the Elements, by Brother Berealdus of the Dominican Order, written in 1464, is preserved in the library of Balliol College, Oxford. The Commentary of Thomas Aquinas on the Liber de Causis is published in the complete editions of his works. Aquinas knew that this book was an Arabic abstract of the Metaphysical Elements of Proclus.
11 Creuzer’s Edition was dedicated to Hegel and Van Heusde. Cousin dedicated his edition of Proclus’ Commentary on the Parmenides to Boissonade, Schelling and Hegel.
I first read the Greek text of the Metaphysical Elements (Στοιχείωσις θεολογικη), in Creuzer’s edition,
12 A second, revised edition appeared in 1816.
In translating the Metaphysical Elements I have spent many intensely laborious but very pleasant and extremely profitable hours. The translation is based on Taylor’s, but it would be an act of injustice to him to call my version a revision of his, though my indebtedness to him is large, and is cheerfully acknowledged. Many of the Propositions I retranslated entirely, and in the others more or less changes were made, for the sake of perspicuity or by way of correction. Taylor’s notes are generally truly illuminative of the subject, and I have reprinted nearly all of them. I am also much indebted to Mr. Thomas Whittaker, whose book, “The Neo-Platonists,” may be strongly commended to all students. His abstract of the Elements is excellent.
Purely philological notes have been omitted. These rightly belong to an edition of the original text, which some day I may publish. As a rule the text as edited by Creuzer, (Francof. 1822), has been followed, but I have adopted most of the emendations of Taylor, and made a few of my own. The Latin version of Franciscus Patricius, (Ferrar. 1583),
13 This is of course a very rare book. It was only in April last that I was able, after a search of many years, to find a copy.
He undoubtedly used a
Greek words and quotations are printed without the accents. It is difficult to get them printed correctly, but there is a better reason for dispensing with them: they are practically useless. They seldom occur in Greek manuscripts before the seventh century of the Christian era. Accents were invented by Aristophanes of Byzantium about 200 B.C., for the purpose of preserving the true pronunciation of the Hellenic language. This they failed to do: the true pronunciation is lost, beyond recovery. We should remember that accents were not devised for scholars.
Probably the best preparation for the apprehension of the Elements is a mastery of Plotinus’ treatise On the Three Archical Hypostases of Things, viz. The Good, Intellect, and Soul. He demonstrates that the Primary Causes can be neither more nor less than these. “But these three are thus denominated, because they are not consubsistent; and they are not consubsistent, because they are essentially different from each other. For, according to Plato, The Good is super-essential; Intellect is an impartible, immovable essence; and Soul is a self-motive essence and subsists as a medium between Intellect and the nature which is distributed about bodies.” The chief aim of Proclus in the Elements is to demonstrate and develop this Platonic insight. The work “contains two hundred and eleven propositions, disposed in a scientific order, and supported by the firmest demonstrations. They begin from super-essential unity, and proceed gradually through all the beautiful and wonderful progressions of divine causes, ending in the self-moving energies of soul. They possess all the accuracy of Euclid, and all the subtility and sublimity necessary to a knowledge of the most profound theology, and may be considered as bearing
Mr. D. E. Wagenhals, of Nashville, Illinois, has ingeniously and admirably illustrated the Propositions of the Metaphysical Elements by geometrical diagrams—a work which I heartily hope will soon be given to the public. These diagrams will much facilitate the student’s apprehension of the Elements. In an Appendix two specimens of these diagrams are presented by the kindness of Mr. Wagenhals.
At the request of friends, a few notes of personal intellectual history are here given. My introduction to the so-called Neo-Platonic philosophy was on a day in the Spring of 1870 when, roaming around the Library of the University of Notre Dame,
14 Then and now the principal Catholic University in America.
15 The last edition of the Chaldean Oracles is by Kroll, (Breslau, 1894). It is philologically good, but philosophically worthless.
16 In June of this year I read Emerson’s works (2 vols., 1869), and his magnificent eulogy at the end of his essay on Intellect on the Trimegisti among whom he ranks the "Neo-Platonists," impressedme greatly. It is somewhat curious that my first knowledge of Emerson came through a hostile review in the Catholic World of this very edition. Emerson is one of the best stimulants to the study of Philosophy, of which I know.
In December, 1870, I procured the original text of the writings of Plotinus, (2 vols. ed. by Adolph Kirchhoff, Lips., 1856). Later I procured the Paris edition, (1855), which has Prolegomena and the Latin version of Marsilius Ficinus.
17 Several years ago I was fortunate to secure a copy of thefirst edition of Ficinus’ translation. which appeared at Florence, Italy, in the month of May 1492, folio. It is a magnificent specimen of typography. The type is large and elegant, the paper is of a superior quality, the margins are wide, and the printing is fine—it will indeed compare favorably with that of the present time. The publication of this work opened to mankind a new intellectual world, just as the discovery of America by Columbus in the same year opened a new physical world.
In 1871 I picked up Taylor’s version of the Select Works of Plotinus, (London, 1817), which is excellent, though almost as concise as the original, and is enriched with useful notes and an Introduction profoundly interesting and valuable. But I soon found that it was an Herculean task to reach the insights of Plotinus. I had a fair mastery of the language, but to apprehend his Thought was very difficult. But I persevered. The gathering of Platonic knowledge, if a matter of constant toil and activity, was
18 A childish performance, translated from the French of Dacier, by “several Hands,” (London, 1701). It passed through six or seven editions, however, in spite of or on account of its worthlessness. The “several Hands” apparently conspired to make this production stale, flat and unprofitable. All the intellectual vitality, force and energy of the Platonic text disappear in this version, and the thought evaporates into persiflage.
Of the three English versions of Plato’s complete writings, Taylor’s is the best, despite some verbal imperfections and infelicities. He knew more Plato, if others knew more Greek. The Bohn translation is largely a piece of hack-work, done to order: it is purely verbal. The translators criticize Taylor severely, but are under deep obligations to him, and inmost of the difficult passages adopt his renderings! Jowett’s version is popular, and is highly esteemed by many. Three editions of it have appeared. In the second and third numerous changes were made. Jowett aimed to make his work better, but his efforts were confined chiefly to the improvement of his style. In his anxiety to turn polished Greek into polished English, he often allowed the force and thought of Plato to escape him. The Platonic style is characteristic of the Greek, and is untranslatable, either into English or any other language. Still, Jowett doubtless expresses as much of the Platonic thought as the average reader will or can assimilate.
but my “knowledge” was
“Night’s candles are burnt out, and jocund day
Stands tiptoe on the misty mountain tops”
By an indefatigable study of the Platonic text, with these and others of the Golden Chain of the Platonic Succession as guides, I was enabled to find and travel the way to the divine Ideas of Plato. The way was not easy, for
“The path by which to deity we climb
Is arduous, rough, ineffable, sublime,”
but every step taken was an encouragement to proceed, by reason of the gain of new insights and a continuous accession of intellectual power.
The Platonic are the only writings to which I can return, in health or in sickness, without satiety, fatigue or dissatisfaction. It matters not how often I open these golden books, I find thoughts and ideas which lift me above the sordid and material cares of life, and which are a perennial consolation and a refuge. These ideas are primarily in the noumenal world, and our apprehension and participation of them here, in the region of time and space, is a foretaste of a perfect participation hereafter, if we qualify ourselves for such an exalted intellectual experience.
Thomas M. Johnson
Osceola. Missouri, October 1909
Proclus’ Metaphysical Elements
Proposition 1. Every multitude partakes in some respect of The One. For if it in no way or degree participates of The One, neither will the whole be one, nor each of the many things from which multitude arises, but each multitude will originate from certain or particular things, and this will continue ad infinitum. And of these in finites each will be again infinite multitude. For, if multitude partakes in no respect of any one, neither as a whole nor through any of its parts, it will be in every respect indeterminate. Each of the many, whichever you may assume, will be one or not one; and if not one will be either many or nothing. But if each of the many is nothing, that likewise which arises from these will be nothing. If each is many, each will consist of infinites without limit. But this is impossible. For there is no being constituted of infinites without limit, since there is nothing greater than the infinite itself; and that which consist of all is greater than each particular thing. Neither is any thing composed of nothing. Every multitude therefore partakes in some respect of The One.
1 Proclus understands by multitude or number every thing which is mixed, compounded, or in any respect non-simple—in brief, all things other than the Supreme One. It has been shown that all things partake in some degree of oneness. By virtue of this participation every number or individual thing is at the same time one and non-one—one through participation or communion but not one essentially, because in this case it would be One itself, and not merely a participant of it. So far as any individual or thing departs from its primal abiding with the Supreme Unity, so far it becomes multiplied or compounded: it becomes one or returns to its original abode exactly to the degree that it rids itself of multiplicity or every thing alien to its true nature.
The orders of multitue are three: (1) Primary, consisting of unities; (2) Composite, consisting of things united; (3) Simple, consisting of the last of things.
“There exist no more beautiful lines in English poetry than the following, taken from the ‘Adonais,’ lines in which the whole system of Plotinus [and Proclus] is summed up in exquisite words:
The One remains, the many change and pass,
Heaven’s light forever shines, Earth’s shadows fly;
Life, like a dome of many-colored glass,
Stains the white radiance of Eternity.”–Kuhns: The Sense of the Infinite
Proposition 2. Every thing which partakes of The One is alike one and not one. For though it is not The One itself—since it participates of The One and is therefore other than it is—it
Proposition 3. Every thing which becomes one, becomes so by the participation of The One, and is one so far as it experiences the participation of The One. For if the things which are not one become one, they doubtless become so by a harmonious alliance and association with each other, and experience the presence of The One, though they are not that which The One is. Hence they participate of The One, so far as they allow themselves to become one. But if they are already one, they will not become one: for that which is, does not become that which it already is. But if they become one from that which was previously not one, they will possess The One, since a certain one was ingenerated in their nature. [And this ingenerated one must be derived from The One itself. Every thing, therefore, which becomes one, becomes so by the participation of The One, etc.]
Proposition 4. Every thing which is united is different from The One itself. For if it is united it will participate in a certain respect of The One, so far as it is rightly said to be united. That, however, which is a participant of The One is both one and not one. But The One itself is not both one and not one: for if this was so, again the one which is in it would have both of these, and this would take place ad infinitum, if there was no One itself at which it is possible to stop; but every thing being one and not one, there will be something united, which is different from The One. For if The One is the same as the united, it will be infinite multitude. And in a similar manner each of the things of which the united
Proposition 5. All multitude is posterior to The One. For if multitude is prior to The One, The One indeed will participate of multitude, but multitude which is prior will not participate of The One, since prior to the existence of The One that multitude was. For it does not participate of that which is not: because a participant of The One is one and at the same time not one—but, on the hypothesis, The One will not yet subsist, that which is first being multitude. But it is impossible that there should be a certain multitude which in no respect whatever participates of The One. Multitude, therefore, is not prior to The One. But if multitude and The One subsist simultaneously, they will be naturally coordinate with each other, and intimately related. Nothing in time prohibits this, since neither is The One essentially many, nor is multitude The One, because they are directly opposite to each other by nature, if neither is prior or posterior to the other. Hence multitude essentially will not be one, and each of the things which are in it will not be one, and this will be the case to infinity, which is impossible. Multitude, therefore, according to its own nature participates of The One, and there is nothing of it which is not one. For if it is not one it will be an infinite, consisting of infinites, as has been demonstrated. Hence it entirely participates of The One. If therefore The One, which is essentially one, in no possible respect participates of multitude, multitude will be wholly posterior to The One—participating indeed of The One, but not being participated by it. But if The One participates of multitude, subsisting indeed as one according to its essence,
2 It is a fundamental principle of the Platonic Philosophy that all things primarily proceed from, and depend on, One First Cause. It necessarily follows from this principle that One precedes Many; or, in other words, that pure, simple being is prior to the compound or multiplied. Every being, other than the First, is to a greater or less degree a number or multitude. Every number or individual thing must in some respect participate of primal oneness—otherwise it could not exist as a whole, nor in each of its parts. In brief, Oneness is absolutely essential to the individual existence of every being or thing. “All beings are beings through The One, both such as are primarily beings, and such as in any respect whatever are said to be classed in the order of beings. What indeed would they be, if they were not one? Truly, if deprived of oneness, they are no longer that which they were said to be. Neither would an army or a choir or a herd exist, as such, unless each of them was one. But neither would a house or a ship have an existence, unless they possessed The One; since a house is one thing, and also a ship, which one if they lose the house will no longer be a house, nor the ship a ship. Continued magnitudes, therefore, unless The One is present in them, will not exist. Hence when they are divided, so far as they lose The One they change their existence. The bodies, also, of plants and animals, each of which is one, if they fly from The One, thereby becoming dissipated into multitude, will lose the essence which they before possessed, no longer being that which they were, but becoming other things, and continuing to be these so long as they are one. Health, likewise, subsists when the body is congregated into one, [i.e. when it possesses symmetry], and beauty flourishes when the nature of The One confines the parts of the body. And Virtue reigns in the soul when the soul tends to unity, and is united in one concord.”–Plotinus: En. VI. Lib. 9.1.
If therefore The One and
Proposition 6. Every multitude consists either of things united, or of unities. It is evident that each of things many will not be itself multitude alone, and, again, that each part of this will not be multitude alone. But if it is not multitude alone, it is either united or unities. And if indeed it partakes of The One it is united; but if it consists of things of which that which is primarily united consists, it will be unities. For if The One itself exists, there is also that which primarily participates of it, and which is primarily united. But this consists of unities: for if it consists of things united, again, things united consist of certain things, and this will be the case to infinity. It is necessary, ever, that what is primarily united should consist of unities. And thus we have discovered what we proposed at first, [viz. that every multitude consists either of things united, or of unities.]
On Producing Causes and Effects
Proposition 7. Every thing productive of another is better than the nature of that which is produced. For it is either superior, or inferior, or equal. Hence that which is produced from this has itself either a power productive of something else, or it is entirely unprolific. But if it is unprolific, by reason of this fact it will be inferior to and unequal to its producer, which is prolific, and has the power of producing. But if it is productive of other things, it either produces that which is equal to itself, and this similarly in all things, and all beings will be equal to each other, and no one thing will be better than another, that which produces always generating that which is equal to itself, in a consequent series; or it produces that which is unequal to itself, and thus that which is produced will no longer be equal to its producer. For it is the province of equal powers to produce equal things: the progeny of these, however, will be unequal to each other, if that which produces indeed is equal to the cause prior to itself, but the thing posterior to it is unequal to it. Hence it is not right that the thing produced should be equal to its producing cause. Moreover, neither will that which produces ever be less than that which is produced by it. For if it imparts essence to the thing produced, it will also supply it with essential power. And if it is productive of all the power which that posterior to itself possesses, it will certainly be able to make itself such as its production is. But if this be so, it will also make itself more powerful; impotency cannot hinder, the productive power being present, nor a defect of will,—since all things naturally desire the good. Hence, if it is able to render another thing more perfect, it will also perfect itself before it perfects
On the First Good, Which is Called The Good Itself
Proposition 8. That which is primarily good, and which is no other than The Good itself, is superior to all things which in any way whatever participate of good. For if all beings desire good, it is evident that the Primary Good is beyond beings. If it is the same with a certain one of beings, either being and The Good are the same, and this particular being will no longer desire good, since it is The Good itself—for that which desires any thing is indigent of that which it desires, and is different from it—or, being is one thing, and the good an other. And if some one being and The Good are the same, being indeed will participate, and that which is participated in being will be The Good. Hence, on this hypothesis, The Good is a certain good inherent in a certain participant and which the participant alone desires, but is not that which is simply good, and which all things desire: for this Good is the common object of desire to all beings. But that which is inherent in a certain thing pertains to that alone which participates of it. Hence that which is prmarily good is nothing else than The Good itself. The adding of any thing else to The Good is to diminish it by the addition, making it a certain or particular good instead of that which is simply good. For the addition, since it is not The Good but something less than it, will by its association diminish The Good.
Proposition 9. Every thing which is self-sufficient, either according to essence or energy, is better than that which is not self-sufficient, and depends on another cause for its perfection. For if all beings naturally desire good, and one thing supplies well-being from itself, but another is indigent of something else, the one indeed will have the cause of good present, but the other separate and apart. To the degree, therefore, that the former is nearer to that which supplies the object of desire, to that extent will it be superior to that which is indigent of a separate cause, and which externally receives the perfection of its nature or its energy. For since the self-sufficient is both similar and diminished, it is more similar to The Good itself [than that which is not self-sufficient]. It is diminished indeed by participating of The Good, and because it is not primarily The Good, though it is allied to it in a certain respect so far as it is able to possess good of and from itself. But to participate good, and to participate through another, are more remote from that which is primarily good, and which is nothing else than good.
Proposition 10. Every thing which is self-sufficient is inferior to that which is simply good. For what else is the self-sufficient than that which from and in itself possesses good? But this is now full of good, and participates of it, but is not that which is simply good: for that is better than participation and plenitude, as has been demonstrated. If therefore the self-sufficient fills itself with good, that from which it
3 “For Intellect subsists after The First, and is indigent of nourishment and intelligence, being proximate to that nature which is indigent of nothing, not even intelligence (thought). Intellect, however, has true plenitude and thought, because it has these primarily: but that which is prior to Intellect and these neither needs nor has, otherwise it would not be The Good itself.”–Plotinus: En. III. Lib. viii, 11.
Proposition 11. All beings proceed from One First Cause. For either there is no cause of any being, or the causes of all finite things revolve in a circle, or the ascent (progression) is to infinity, and one thing is the cause of another, and the pre-subsistence of essence (cause) will in no respect cease. If, however, there is no cause of beings, there will be neither an order of things second and first, of things perfecting and perfected, of things adorning and adorned, of things generating and generated, and of agents and patients, nor will there be any science of beings. For the knowledge of causes is the work of science, and we are then said to know scientifically when we know the causes of things. But if causes revolve in a circle, the same things will be prior and posterior, more powerful and more imbecile. For every thing which produces is better than the nature of that which is produced. Nor does it make a difference to conjoin cause to effect, and through many or
And if the addition of causes is to infinity, and there is always again a cause prior to another, there will be no science of any being: for there is not a knowledge of any thing infinite. But causes being unknown, neither will there be a science of the things consequent to the causes. If, therefore, it is necessary that there should be a cause of beings, and causes are distinct from the things caused, and there is not an ascent to infinity, there is a First Cause of beings, from which as from a root every thing proceeds,—some things indeed being nearer to but others more remote from it. The necessity of the existence of One Principle has been demonstrated, because all multitude is secondary to The One.
Proposition 12. The Principle and First Cause of all beings is The Good Itself. For if all things proceed from one cause, [as has been demonstrated], it is necessary to call that cause either The Good, or that which is better than The Good. But if it is better than The Good, is any thing imparted by it to beings, and to the nature of beings, or nothing? And if nothing is imparted by it, an absurdity will result. For we would no longer rank it in the order of causes, since it is everywhere necessary that something should be present from cause to the things caused, and especially from the First Cause, on which all things depend, and by reason of which every being exists. But if something is imparted by it, in the same manner as there is by The Good, there will be something better than goodness in beings, emanating from the First Cause.
Proposition 13. Every good has the power of uniting its participants, and every union is good; and The Good is the same as The One. For if The Good is preservative of all beings—by reason of which it is desirable to all things—that indeed which is preservative and connective of the essence of every thing is The One. For by The One all things are preserved, but dispersion expells every thing from its essence. If this be the case, The Good will cause those things to which it is present to be one, and will connect and contain them through union. And if The One is collective and connective of beings, it will perfect each of them by its presence. The union therefore which unites a thing with all is a good. But if union is a good per se, and Good itself has a unifying power, that which is simply good and simply one are the same, causing beings to be both good and one. Hence those things which in a certain way or respect fall off from The Good,
4 “The Good is that on which all depends, and which all things desire and have as a principle, and of which they are all indigent, while The Good itself lacks absolutely nothing, is wholly self-sufficient, and is the measure and limit of all; producing of itself intellect, essence, soul, life and intellectual energy.”–Plotinus: En. I. Lib. 8. 10.
On the Immovable and Self-Motive Principle or Cause
Proposition 14. Every being is either immovable or moved. And if moved, it is either moved by itself, or by another: and if it is moved by itself it is self-motive, but if by another it is alter-motive. Every nature, therefore, is either immovable, self-motive, or alter-motive. For it is necessary, since there are alter-motive natures, that there also should be that which is immovable, and the self-motive nature, which is a medium between them. For if every alter-motive thing is moved because it is moved by another, motions will be either in a circle, or they will proceed to infinity. But neither will they be in a circle, nor proceed ad infinitum, since all beings are limited by the Principle of things, and that which moves is better than that which is moved. Hence there will be something immovable, which first moves. But if this be so, it is necessary that the self-motive exist. For if all things should stop, what will that be which is first moved? It cannot be the immovable, for this is not naturally adapted to be moved; nor the alter-motive,
Corollary. From the premises, therefore, it is evident, that of things which are moved, the self-motive nature is the first; but that of things which move other things the immovable is the first.
5 Axiom 1. “All things are either in themselves or in others.” Axiom 2. “That which cannot be conceived as through another must be conceived as through itself.”–Spinoza.
On an Incorporeal Essence, and What the Characteristic of it Is
Proposition 15. Every thing which is able to return to itself is incorporeal. For no body is, by reason of its nature, competent to return to itself. For if that which is converted to any thing is conjoined with that to which it is converted, it is evident that all the parts of the body which is converted to itself will be conjoined with all the parts. For a thing is converted to itself, when both that which is converted, and that to which it is converted, become one. This however is impossible in body, and, in short, in all partible things. For the whole of that which is partible is not conjoined with the whole, on account of the separation of its parts, which lie outside one another. No body, therefore, is naturally able to return to itself, so that the whole may be converted to the whole. Hence,
6 There is no more important or significant word in the Platonic vocabulary than επιστροϕη, επιστρειϕειν (a conversion, a turning back, a return to self). It is comprehensive more or less of self-activity, self-development, self-determination, self-knowledge, self-reflection, self-relation, self-consciousness. It is essentially self-reflection or self-relation.
“Great stress is laid on self-relation (επιστρειϕειν) as the form of the highest order of being; and this is what Hegel’s school of philosophy lay so much stress upon, as the doctrine of ‘return-to-self.’ It is the form of consciousness, and life, and moral habit; and its image is found in the Cosmos in the shape of orbital movement, diurnal revolution, recurrence of seasons, etc. The external image of this return-to-self-through-other has given the forms of speech in all languages for what is divine, and hence the sun-myth and other astronomical scaffolding of mythologies.”–Dr. Harris. (Memoir of A. Bronson Alcott, by F. B. Sanborn and William T. Harris. This is one of the most interesting and valuable biographies in the English language.)
“The Intellect sees because it is turned back to its origin, the One; its movement is circular, i.e. reflexive, or turned back upon itself, conscious.”–Plotinus: En. V. Lib. I. ch 7. “For there are two orders of knowing, (Plotinus, En. V. Lib. 6.),—self-knowing and the knowing of something different from the self. Self-knowing is the primary or highest act of the Intellect,—that whereby it returns to its source, the One.”–Dr. Harris.
“Nothing really exists which is not self-determined and self-related,—which has not a self which it maintains through all its changes.”–Hegel.
Proposition 16. Every thing which is able to return to itself has an essence separate from every body. For unless it was separate from every body whatsoever, it would not have a certain activity or act apart from body: since it is impossible that, the essence being inseparable from body, an activity (act) proceeding from essence (body) should be separate. For in this case its activity would be better than its essence, because the
7 {The placement of this note in thhe text is merely inferred.} Or, is primarily self-active.
Proposition 17. Every thing which moves itself primarily
If, however, the whole moves, but the part is moved, or the contrary, there will be a certain part in each which in one and the same subject moves and at the same time is moved.
8 For if the whole moves, the part which is moved will at the same time be motive.–Taylor.
9 See the 7th Proposition.
If, however, one and the same thing moves and is moved, it will have the energy of moving
Proposition 18. Every thing which imparts being to others is itself primarily that which it communicates to other natures. For if it gives being, and makes the impartance from its own essence, that which it gives is subordinate to its own essence,
9 See the 7th Proposition.
Proposition 19. Every thing which is primarily inherent in a certain nature of beings is present to all the beings which are arranged according to that nature, conformably to one reason, and in the same manner. For unless it was present to all of them in the same manner, but present to some and not to others, it is evident that it would not be primarily in that nature, but in some things primarily, and in others secondarily, which sometimes participate of it. For that which at one time exists, but at another time does not, does not exist primarily, nor of itself: but it is adventitious, and comes from some other place to the things in which it is thus inherent.
Proposition 20. The essence of soul is beyond all bodies, the intellectual nature is beyond all souls, and The One is beyond all intellectual hypostases. For every body is movable by another, but is not naturally competent to move itself, but by the presence of soul it is moved of itself, lives through soul, and, when soul is present is in a certain respect self-movable, but when it is absent is alter- movable, because any self-movable nature which it may have it receives from soul, which is allotted a self-movable essence: since, to whatever nature soul is present, to this it imparts self-motion. Soul is, however, by a much greater priority that which it imparts by its very being. Hence it is beyond bodies, which become self-movable by participation, because it is essentially self-movable. Again, however, soul which is moved from itself has an order secondary to the im movable nature, which subsists immovable, in activity or energy. Because of all the natures that are moved, the self-movable essence is the leader; but of all that
Moreover, The One is prior to intellect. For intellect, though it is immovable, yet is not The One; for it thinks itself, and energizes about itself. And of The One indeed all beings, in whatever way they may exist, participate; but all beings do not participate of intellect. For those beings to whom intellect is present by participation necessarily participate of knowledge; because intellectual knowledge is the principle and first cause of gnostic energy. The One, therefore, is beyond intellect, nor is there any thing beyond The One: for The One and The Good are the same. But The Good, as has been demonstrated, is the principle of all things.
That Intellect is not the First Cause
Proposition 21. Every order, beginning from a monad, proceeds into a multitude coordinate to the monad, and the multitude of every order is referred to one monad. For the monad, having the relation of a principle, generates a multitude allied to itself. Hence one causal chain and one whole order has a decrement into multitude
For let one thing be the cause of another, among things that are under the same causal chain or series; but that which ranks as the cause of the one series must necessarily be prior to all in that series, and all things must be generated by it as coordinate, not so that each will be a certain particular thing, but that each will belong to this order.
11 Additional Note: The truth of this may be exemplified in light. Thus for instance we may see many species of light; one kind emanating from the sun, another from fire and the stars, another from the moon, and another from the eyes of many animals. But this light though various is everywhere similar, and discovers in its operations a unity of nature. On account of its uniformity, therefore, it requires one principle and not different principles. But the sun is the only principle of all mundane light: and though there are many participants of light posterior to the solar orb, yet they scatter their uniform light through one solar nature, property and power. But if we again seek for the principle of light in the sun, we cannot say that the solar orb is the principle; for the various parts of it diffuse many illuminations. There will therefore be many principles. But we now require one first principle of light. And if we say that the soul of the sun generates light, we must observe that this is not effected by her psychical multiplicity, or she would diffuse different lights. Hence we must assert that she generates visible by intellectual light. But again this production does not subsist through intellectual variety, but rather through the unity of intellect which is its flower and summit. This unity is a symbol of that simple unity which is the principle of the universe. And to this principle the solar intellect is united by its unity, and through this it becomes a God. This divine unity of the sun therefore is the principle of the uniform light of the world, in the same manner as simple unity and goodness is the source of intelligible light to all intelligible natures.–Taylor.
Corollary. From these things it is evident that both one and multitude are inherent in the nature of body; that nature has many natures co-dependent on it; and that many natures proceed from the one nature of the universe. Further, that the order of souls originates from one first soul, proceeds with diminution into the multitude of souls, and reduces multitude into one; that in the intellectual essence there is an intellectual monad, and a multitude of intellects proceeding from one intellect, and returning to it; that there is a multitude of
11 {Note 11 is designated twice in the original.} This will be evident by considering that The One, or the First Principle of all, must produce that which first proceeds from himself by union. And as his first production must be the most similar of all things to himself, and must be at the same time multitude,—or in what respect would it differ from The One—hence it is necessary that this progression be no other than self-perfect unities. In consequence thereof of this sublime doctrine, as Proclus beautifully observes, (Theol. Plat. p. 123), there is One God and many gods; one Unity and many unities prior to beings; and one Goodness and many goodnesses, after the First Good. It likewise follows that the First Principle of all is a super-essential One, and that after this One there are many super-essential unities. And we may consider every unity of beings as the flower of some certain being; and as the summit and centre about which every being subsists. For a further account and confirmation of this sublime doctrine, study the third book of Proclus on Plato’s Theology.-Taylor.
Proposition 22. Every thing which subsists primarily and principally in each order is one, and is neither two, nor more than two, but is wholly one alone. For, if it be possible, let there be two things which thus subsist, since there will be the same impossibility if there are more than two; or let that which subsists primarily consist of each of these. But if, indeed, it consists of each it will again be one, and there will not be two things which are first. And if it be one of the two, each will not be first. Nor, if both are equally primary, will each have a principal subsistence. For if one of them is primary, but this is not the same with the other, what will it be in that order? For that subsists primarily
If, therefore, these differ from each other, but they do not primarily differ so far as they are that which they are said to be,—for this primarily experiences that which is the same,—both will not be first, but will be that of which both participating are thereby said to subsist primarily.
Corollary. From these things it is evident that what is primarily being is one alone, and that there are not two primary beings, or more than two; that the first intellect is one alone, and that there are not two first intellects; and that the first soul is one. This is also the case with every form, such as the primarily beautiful and the primarily equal. Thus, too, with respect to the form of animals, and the form of man, the first of each is one; for the demonstration is the same.
Proposition 23. Every imparticipable produces the things which are participated: and alt the natures which are participated strive for imparticipable essences. For that which is imparticipable, having the relation of a monad, as subsisting from itself and not from another, and being exempt from participants, produces those things which may be participated. For either it is of itself barren, remaining within itself, and possessing nothing worthy of honor, or it will impart something from itself. And that which receives indeed from it will participate it; but that which was given will subsist. But every thing participating of another by which it is generated, is secondary to that which is similarly present to
12 The imparticipable is that which is not consubsistent with a subordinate nature. Thus imparticipable intellect is the intellect which is not consubsistent with soul, but is exempt from it. And imparticipable soul is the soul which is not consubsistent with body. And so in other things.–Taylor.
Proposition 24. Every thing which participates is inferior to that which is participated by it; and that which is participated is inferior to that which is imparticipable. For that which participates, since it is imperfect prior to participation, but becomes perfect through participation, is entirely secondary to that which is participated so far as it is perfect by participating. For so far as it was imperfect it is inferior to that which it participates, which causes it to become perfect. But that which is participated by a certain one and not by all, is on this account allotted an hyparxis or essence subordinate to that which is common to all things, and not to a certain one thing: for the latter is more allied but the
The imparticipable, therefore, is the leader of things which are participated; but the latter are the leaders of participants. For, in short, the imparticipable is one prior to the many; but that which is participated in the many is one and at the same time not one; and every thing which participates is not one and at the same time one.
Proposition 25. Every thing perfect proceeds to the generation of those things which it is able to produce, imitating the One Principle of all. For as the one Principle by reason of its own goodness is unically constitutive of all beings,—for The Good and The One are the same, so that the boniform is the same with the unical,—thus, also, those things which are posterior to the First Principle, on account of their perfection, hasten to generate beings inferior to their own essence: for perfection is a certain part or quality of The Good, and the perfect so far as it is perfect imitates The Good. But The Good is constitutive of all things: so that the perfect is likewise productive according to its nature of those things which it is able to produce. And that indeed which is more perfect, the more perfect it is the more numerous are the progeny of which it is the cause. For that which is more perfect participates in a greater degree of The Good. It is therefore nearer to The Good, is more allied to the cause of all, and is the cause of a greater number of effects. That, however, which is more imperfect, the more imperfect it is the less numerous are the effects of which it is the cause; for, being more remote from the producer of
Corollary. From the premises it is evident that the nature which is most remote from the Principle of all is unprolific and is not the cause of any thing. For if it generated a certain thing, and had something posterior to itself, it is evident that it would no longer be the most remote, but that which it produced would be more remote than itself from the Principle of all things; it would therefore be nearer to productive power, and, in addition, would imitate the cause which is productive of all beings.
Proposition 26. Every cause which is productive of other things, itself abiding in itself, produces the natures posterior to itself, and those which are successive. For if it imitates The One, but that immovably constitutes the things posterior to itself, every thing which produces will possess in a similar manner the cause of productive energy. But The One constitutes things immovably. For if through motion, the motion will be in it; and, being moved, it will no longer be The One, be cause it will be changed from The One. But if motion subsists together with or after it, it will also be from The One, and either there will be a progression to infinity, or The One will produce immovably, and every thing which produces will imitate the producing cause
Proposition 27. Every producing cause, by reason of its perfection and abundance of power, is productive of secondary natures. For if it produced not on account of the perfect, but through a defect of power, it would not be able to preserve its own order immovable. For that which imparts being to another thing through defect and imbecility imparts subsistence to it through its own mutation and change in quality. But every thing which produces remains such as it is, and in consequence of thus remaining that which is posterior to it proceeds into existence. Hence, being full and perfect, it constitutes secondary natures immovably and without diminution, it being that which it is, and neither being changed into them nor diminished. For that which is produced is not a distribution into parts of the producing cause; since this is neither appropriate to generation, nor to generating causes. Nor is it a transition of one nature into another: for it does not become the matter of that which proceeds; since it remains such as it is, and that which is produced is different from it. Hence that which generates abides without alteration and undiminished; through prolific power multiplies itself, and from itself imparts secondary hypostases or natures.
Proposition 28. Every producing cause constitutes things similar to itself, prior to such as are dissimilar. For since that which produces is necessarily more excellent than the thing produced, they can never be simply the same with each other and equal in power. But if they are not the same and equal, but different and unequal, they are either entirely separated from each other, or they are both united and separated. If, however, they are entirely separated, they will not accord with each other, and nowhere will that which proceeds from a cause sympathize with it. Hence, neither will one of these participate of the other, since they are entirely different from it. For that which is participated gives communion to its participant with reference to that of which it participates. Moreover, it is necessary that the thing caused should participate of its cause, as from thence deriving its essence.
But if that which is produced is partly separated from and partly united to its producing cause,—if, indeed, it experiences each of these equally,—it will equally participate and not participate: so that in the same manner it will have essence and not have it from the producing cause. And if it is more separated from than united to it, the thing generated will be more foreign than allied to that by which it is generated, will be more unadapted than adapted to it, and be more deprived of than possess sympathy with it. If, therefore, the things which proceed from causes are allied to them according to their very being, have sympathy with them, are naturally dependent on them, and aspire after contact with them, desiring good, and obtaining the object of their desire through the cause of their existence—if this be the case, it is evident that things produced are in a greater degree united to their producing causes than separated from
Proposition 29. Every progression is effected through a similitude of secondary to primary natures. For if that which produces constitutes similars prior to dissimilars, the similitude derived from the producing causes will constitute the things produced. For similars are rendered similar through similitude, and not through dissimilitude. If, therefore, progression in its diminution preserves a certain sameness of that which is generated with that which generates, and shows that such as the generator is primarily so is that posterior to it secondarily, it will have its nature through similitude.
Proposition 30. Every thing which is produced from a certain tiling without a medium, abides in its producing cause, and proceeds from it. For if every progression is effected while primary natures remain permanent, and is accomplished through similitude, similars being constituted prior to dissimilars—if this be the case, that which is produced will in a certain respect abide in its producing cause. For that which entirely proceeds will have nothing which is the same with the abiding cause, but will be perfectly separated from it, But if it has any thing in common with and united to it, it will abide in its cause in the same manner as that abides in itself. If, however, it abides only but does not proceed, it will in no respect differ from its cause, nor will it while that abides be generated something different from it. For if it is something
Proposition 31. Everything which proceeds from another essentially, returns to that from which it proceeds. For if it should proceed, indeed, but should not return to the cause of this progression, it would not desire its cause. For every thing which desires is converted to the object of its desire. Moreover, every thing desires good, and to each thing the attainment of it is through the proximate cause. Every thing, therefore, desires its cause: and the cause of being to any particular thing is likewise the cause of well-being (good) to it. But desire is primarily directed to the cause of well-being: and conversion or return is to that to which desire primarily tends.
Proposition 32. Every conversion or return is effected through the similitude of the things converted to that to which they are converted. For every thing which is converted hastens to be conjoined with its cause, and desires communion and colligation with it. But similitude binds all things together, just as dissimilitude separates and disjoins all things. If, therefore, conversion or return is a certain communion and contact, but all communion and all contact
Proposition 33. Every thing which proceeds from another and returns to it has a circular energy (activity). For if it returns to that from which it proceeds, it conjoins the end to the beginning, and the motion is one and continuous—emanating from the abiding cause and returning to it. Hence all things proceed in a circle from causes to causes: but there are greater and less circles of conversions (returns), some of which are to the natures immediately above the things which are converted, but others are to still higher natures, and so on to the Principle of all things. For all things proceed from this Principle, and return to it.
13 In order to understand this Proposition the reader must observe that the hypothesis requires that both the progression and regression subsist together. And this hypothesis is no less proper than true: for unless effects were continually converted to their causes they could not exist, since they depend on these for their subsistence, and this can only be procured by conversion.–Taylor.
Proposition 34. Every thing which is converted according to nature makes its return to that from which it received the progression of its characteristic essence. For if it is converted according to nature, it will have an essential desire for that to which it is converted. But if this be the case, the whole being of it depends on that to which it makes an essential conversion, and it is essentially similar to it. Hence also it has a natural sympathy with it because it is cognate to the essence of it. If this be so, either the being of each is the same, or the one is derived from the other, or both are allotted similitude from a certain other one. But if the being of
Corollary. From these things, therefore, it is evident that intellect is the object of desire to all things, that all things proceed from intellect, and that the whole world, though it is eternal, possesses its essence from intellect. For the world is not prevented from proceeding from intellect because it is eternal: neither because it is always arranged is it not converted to intellect, but it always proceeds, is essentially eternal, always converted, and is indissoluble because it always remains in the same order.
Proposition 35. Every thing caused abides in, proceeds from, and returns to, its cause. For if it alone abided, it would in no respect differ from its cause, since it would be without separation and distinction from it. For progression is accompanied with separation. But if it alone proceeded, it would be unconjoined and deprived of sympathy with its cause, having no communication with it whatever. And if it were alone converted, how can that which has not its essence from the cause be essentially converted to that which is foreign to its nature? But if it should abide and proceed, but should not return, how will there be a natural desire to every thing of well-being and of good, and an excitation to its generating cause? And if it should proceed and return, but should not abide, how, being separated from its cause, will it hasten to be conjoined with it? For it was unconjoined prior to its
14 The return or conversion (επιστροϕη) is a rectifying of the way of life (ενστασεως επανορθωσις). As all things proceed from The One, so all yearn for their Principle and return to it, to the extent of their power. There are three primary forms of return, viz. through essence, through life, through knowledge. And in every Principle there are abiding, progression and return (μονη, σταθερή, πρόοδος επιστροφή).
Proposition 36. Of all things which are multiplied in progression the first are more perfect than the second, the second than those posterior to them, and after the same manner successively. For if progressions separate productions from their causes, and there are diminutions of things secondary with respect to those which are first, it follows that first natures in proceeding are more conjoined with their causes, being as it were germinations from them. But secondary natures are more remote from their causes, and in a similar manner those which are successive. Things, however, which are nearer and more allied to their causes are more perfect. For causes are more perfect than things caused. But things which are more remote are more imperfect, because they are dissimilar to their causes.
Proposition 37. Of all things which subsist according to conversion, the first are more imperfect than the second, and the second than those that follow; but the last are the most perfect. For if conversions are effected in a circle, and con version or return is to that from which progression is derived, but progression is from that which is most perfect, hence conversion tends to the most perfect. And if conversion first begins from that in which progression terminates, but progression terminates in that which is most imperfect, conversion will begin from the most im perfect. Hence in things which subsist according to conversion, the most imperfect are the first, but the most perfect are the last.
Proposition 38. Every thing which proceeds from many causes returns through as many, and every conversion is through the same causes which produced the progression.
15 “The principal momenta in the dialectical process by which, according to Proclus, the formation of the world was accomplished, are the issuing of a thing from the cause and its return to the same. That which is brought forth is at the same time like and unlike its cause: in virtue of its likeness it is contained and remains in its cause; in virtue of its unlikeness it is separated from it; it must return to its cause by becoming like it, and in this return the same stadia are involved as in the previous forward or out-coming movement. All reality is subject to this law of triadic development. But the oftener the process is repeated the less perfect is the result. What is first is highest, the last is the lowest in rank and worth. The development is a descending one, and may be symbolized by the descending course of a spiral line.”-Ueberweg.
But
Proposition 39. Every being either alone essentially returns, or vitally, or gnostically. For either it alone possesses being from its cause, or life with being, or it receives from thence a gnostic power. So far, therefore, as every being alone is, itmakes an essential conversion, but so far as it lives, a vital, and so far as it knows, agnostic conversion. For as it proceeded from its cause, so does it return to it, and the measures of its conversion are limited by the measures according to its progression. The desire to return therefore is to some according to being alone, this desire being an aptitude for the participation of causes; but to others it is according to life, being a motion to more excellent natures; and to others it is according to knowledge, being a conscious perception of the goodness of their causes.
Proposition 40. The natures which exist from and of themselves, and have a self-subsistent essence, precede those which proceed from another cause. For if every nature which is self-sufficient, either by reason of its essence or energy, is more excellent than that which depends on another cause; and that which produces itself, since it produces the being of itself, is sufficient to itself with respect to essence; and that which is alone produced by another is not sufficient to itself;
Proposition 41. Every thing which is in another is alone produced by another; but every thing which is in itself is self-subsistent. For that which is in another and is indigent of a subject can never be generative of itself. For that which is naturally competent to generate itself does not require another base, because it is contained by itself, and is preserved in itself apart from a subject. But that which abides, and is able to be established in itself, is productive of itself, itself proceeding into itself, and being
Proposition 42. Every thing self-subsistent is able to return to itself. For if it proceeds from itself, it will likewise return to itself. For to that which is the source of a progression there is a return coordinate to the progression. For if it alone proceeded from itself, and did not return to it self, it would never strive for its characteristic good, and that which it is able to impart to itself. Every cause, however, is able to impart to that which proceeds from it both essence and well-being conjoined with this essence. Hence that which is self-subsistent will impart this to itself. This therefore is the proper good to that which is self-subsistent. And hence this will not be the object of desire to that which does not return to itself. But not desiring this good, it will not obtain it, and not obtaining it, it will be imperfect and not self-sufficient. If, however, self-sufficiency and perfection belong to any thing, it must be to that which is self-subsistent. Hence it will desire and obtain its characteristic good, and will return to itself.
Proposition 43. Every thing which is able to return to itself is self-subsistent. For if it returns to itself according to nature, it is perfect in the conversion to itself, and will possess essence from itself. For from every thing to which there is a return according to nature, there is equally a progression
Proposition 44. Every thing which is able to return to itself through energy or activity, is likewise able to return to itself through essence. For if it is capable of reverting to itself through its activity but not through its essence, it will be more excellent inactivity than in essence, the former being revertive, but the latter not. For that which depends on itself is better than that which alone depends on another. And that which has a power of preserving itself is more perfect than that which is alone preserved by another. If, therefore, it is revertible to itself through the activity emanating from essence, it will also be allotted a revertible essence, so that it will not alone energize within itself but will depend on itself, and will be contained, connected, and perfected by itself.
Proposition 45. Every thing self-subsistent is unbegotten. For if it be generated, because of its generation it will be imperfect of itself, and will be indigent of perfection emanating from another. Because, however, it produces itself, it is perfect and self-sufficient. For every thing generated is perfected by another, which imparts generation to it not yet existing. For generation is a path from the imperfect to its contrary, the perfect. But if any thing produces itself it is always perfect, since it is always present with the cause of itself, or rather is inherent in that which is perfective of its essence.
Proposition 46. Every thing self-subsistent is incorruptible. For if it should be corrupted, it would depart from itself and would be without itself. This, however, is impossible. For, since it is one, it is at the same time cause and the thing-caused. But every thing which is corrupted, is corrupted departing from its cause. For so far as it adheres to that which contains, connects, and preserves it, it is connected and preserved But that which is self-subsistent never leaves its cause because it does not desert itself: for it is its own cause. Every thing, therefore, which is self-subsistent is incorruptible.
Proposition 47. Every thing self-subsistent is impartible and simple. For if it is partible, since it is self-subsistent, it will constitute itself partible, and the whole will return to itself, and all will be in all itself.
16 This is absurd, because every partible nature must be converted to something different from itself, on account of its parts. So, likewise, since a self-subsistent nature resides in itself, if such a nature was partible one divisible whole would be in another, not different from itself.–Taylor.
17 Because every composite consists of matter and form; the former of which is less and the latter more excellent.–Taylor.
18 See Porphyry’s Auxiliaries to the Perception of Intelligible Natures, Nos. 33. and 36.
On the Perpetual, Demonstrating That the World is Perpetual
Proposition 48. Every thing which is not perpetual is either a composite or subsists in another. For either it is dissoluble into those things of which
19 “He participates also the eternity of Intellect, as an image thereof; otherwise he would at some time cease to possess that image. But this is not an image formed by art; and every image formed by nature lasts as long as its archetype endures. For this reason they are not in the right who suppose that the sensible world will perish while the intelligible remains, and who think the former was produced as the result of deliberation on the part of the Creator. For whatever be the manner of such a creation, they will not understand, nor do they know, that as long as that intelligible world shines, this world of ours will never fail, but since that is, this also exists. But the intelligible world ever was and ever will be; for we are obliged, by the desire of signifying something concerning it, to employ such words as these” i.e., such expressions as “was” and “will be” cannot properly be applied to that which is eternal.–Plotinus: En. V. Lib. 8. 12. An excellent translation of this book, Concerning Intelligible Beauty, by W. C. Ward, appeared in The Theosophical Review. See further, on the Perpetuity of the World, Plotinus: En. II. Lib. 1., On the Heaven, and En. III. Lib. 7., On Eternity and Time; Proclus: Theol. Plat. Lib. III. 16., and Stobaeus in Eclog. Lib. I. cap. 22.
Το αιδιον, The Perpetual. Is that which subsists always, but is connected with the three parts of time, the past, present, and future. Hence the fabricator of the world is eternal, but the world is perpetual.–Taylor.
Το αιωνιον, The Eternal. Is that which has a never ending subsistence, without any connection with time. For Eternity, as it is profoundly defined by Plotinus, is infinite life, the whole of which is at once present, without any thing belonging to it being consumed, and in which there is neither past nor future. (En. III. Lib. 7.)–Taylor.
Proposition 49. Every self-subsistent native is perpetual. For there are two modes according to which it is necessary a thing should not be perpetual: the one arising from composition, and the other from a subsistence in something else, as in a subject. That which is self-subsistent, however, is neither a composite but a simple, nor in another but in itself. Hence it is perpetual.
Proposition 50. Every thing which is measured by time, either according to essence or according to activity, is generation so far as it is measured by time. For if it is measured by time it will belong to it to be, or to act, in time; and the was and the will be, which differ from each other, pertain to it. For if the was and the will be were the same in number, that which is measured by time would suffer nothing by time proceeding, and always having one part prior and another posterior. If, therefore, the was and the will be are different, that which is measured by time is becoming to be and never is, but proceeds together with time by which it is measured, existing in a tendency to being.
20 Additional Note: The truth of this reasoning may be evinced by the following considerations. Every thing which is measured by time, and such is every corporeal nature, depends on time for the perfection of its being. But time is composed of the past, present and future. And if we conceive that any one of these parts is taken away from the nature with which it is connected, that nature must immediately perish. Time therefore is so essentially and intimately united with the natures which it measures that their being such as it is depends on the existence of time. But time, as it is evident, is perpetually flowing, and this in the most rapid manner imagination can conceive. It is evident therefore that the natures to which it is essential must subsist in a manner equally transitory arid flowing; since, unless they flowed in conjunction with time, they would be separated from it, and would consequently perish. Hence as we cannot affirm with propriety of any part of time that it is—since even before we can form the assertion the present time is no more—so, with respect to all corporeal natures, from their subsistence in time, before we can say they exist they lose all identity of being.
Such then is the unreal condition of every thing existing in time, or of every thing corporeal and entangled with matter. But this shadowy essence of body is finely unfolded by Plotinus, in the 6th book of his 3rd Ennead, as follows: “Being properly so called is neither body, nor is subject to corporeal affections; but body and its properties belong to the region of non-entity. But you will ask, how is it possible that visible matter should possess no real being; that matter in which stones and mountains reside, the solid earth, and bodies, which mutually resist,—since bodies, which impel each other, confess by their collision the reality of their existence? You will likewise ask, in what manner things which neither strike against nor resist each other, which neither externally act nor internally suffer, nor are in any respect the objects of sight, viz. soul and intellect, are to be reckoned true and real beings? We reply, that on the contrary things more corpulent are more sluggish and inert, as is evident in bulky masses of earth. But whatever is less ponderous is more movable, and the more elevated the more movable. Hence fire, the most movable of all the elements, flies as it were from a corporeal nature. Moreover, as it appears to me, whatever is more sufficient to itself disturbs others less and brings less inconvenience; but such things as are more ponderous and terrene, unable from their defect of being to raise themselves on high, and becoming debile and languid, strike and oppress surrounding bodies by their falling ruin and sluggish weight. Since it is evident that bodies destitute of life fall with molestation on any proximate substance, and more vehemently impel and pain whatever is endued with sense. On the contrary animated beings, participating more of entity, by how much the more of being they possess by so much the more harmless they impinge their neighboring bodies. Hence motion, which is a kind of life or soul, or an imitation of life in bodies, is more present to whatever is less corpulent; as if more of body was necessarily produced, where a defect of being happens in a greater degree. Again, it will more manifestly appear from passivity that whatever is more corpulent is more passive—earth in a greater degree than the other elements, and the rest in a similar proportion. For some things when divided suddenly return to their former union, when no obstacle prevents their conjunction. But from the section of a terrene body the divided portions always remain separate, as if destitute of natural vigor, and without any inherent desire of union and consent. Hence they are ready by every trifling impulse to remain as they are impelled; to rush from the embraces of bound, and hasten into multitude and non-entity. So that whatever becomes corporeal in an eminent degree, as falling fast into non-entity, has but little power of recalling itself into one. And on this account ponderous and vehement concussions are attended with ruin, when by mutual rushing one thing impels another. But when debility runs against debility, the one is valid against the other, in the same manner as non-entity rushing on non-entity. And this we think a sufficient refutation of their opinion who only place being in the genus of body, persuaded by the testimony of impulses and concussions, and the phantasms perceived through the senses, which testify that sense is the only standard of truth. Such as these are affected in a manner similar to those in a dream, who imagine that the perceptions of sleep are true. For sense is alone the employment of the dormant soul; since as much of the soul as is merged in body so much of it sleeps. But a true elevation and a true vigilance are a resurrection from and not with the dull mass of body. For a resurrection with body indeed is only a transmigration from sleep to sleep, and from dream to dream, like a man passing in the dark from bed to bed. But that elevation is perfectly true, which entirely rises from the dead weight of bodies, For these, possessing a nature repugnant to soul, possess something opposite to essence. Andthis is further evident from their generation, and their continual flowing and decay, which are properties entirely foreign from the nature of being substantial and real.”–Taylor.
It likewise does not stop in the same state of being, but is always receiving another and another being, just as the now in time is always another and another, through the progression of time. Hence it is not a simultaneous whole; for it subsists in a dispersion of temporal extension,
Proposition 51. Every thing self-subsistent is essentially exempt from the natures which are measured by time. For if that which is self-subsistent is unbegotten, it will not be measured by time, according to existence. For generation is conversant with the nature which is measured by time. Hence nothing self-subsistent has its being in time.
Proposition 52. Every thing eternal is a whole which subsists at once: whether it has its essence alone eternal, possessing the whole at once present, but not having one of its parts already constituted, and another to be constituted because it is not yet in existence, but as much as is possible it now possesses the whole without diminution and without extension—or whether it has its activity as well as its essence at once present, it possessing this likewise collectively, abiding in the same measure of perfection, and as it were fixed immovably and without transition according to one and the same boundary. For if the eternal, as the name denotes, is unceasing being, but being and becoming to be are different from unceasing being, it is not right that it should have one thing prior and another posterior. For in that case it would be generation and not being. But where there is neither prior nor posterior, nor was and will be, but being alone, and this a whole, there every thing subsists at once that which it is. The same thing likewise takes place with respect to the activity of that which is eternal.
Corollary. From this it is evident that eternity is the cause to wholes of their existence as wholes, since every thing which is eternal either in essence or in energy, has the whole of its essence or energy present to itself.
On Eternity and Eternal Natures
Proposition 53. Eternity subsists prior to all eternal natures, and time exists prior to every thing which subsists in time. For if everywhere the natures which are participated are prior to their participants, and imparticipables are prior to participated natures, it is evident that the eternal is one thing, the eternity which is in the eternal another, and eternity itself another. And the first of these indeed subsists as a participant, the second as a thing participated, and the third as an imparticipable. That likewise which is in time is one thing, for it is a participant; the time which is in this is another thing, for it is participated: and the time prior to this is another thing, for it is imparticipable. Everywhere, also, each of these is from the imparticipable, which is in all things the same. But that which is participated is in those things only by which it is participated. For there are many eternal and many temporal natures, in all of which eternity subsists by participation. The time also which is in temporal natures subsists divisibly; but the time which they participate is indivisible. And there is one time prior to both of these. Eternity itself, likewise, is an eternity of eternities, and time itself is a time of times; and the one constitutes participated eternity, but other participated time.
21 See Plato’s Timaeus, pp. 36, 38; Aristotle’s On the Heaven, I. 9; Plotinus’ book, On Eternity and Time; Proclus On the Theology of Plato, I. 13., III. 16., and V. 30; and Jo. Laur. Lydus De Mensibus, p. 41.
Proposition 54. Every eternity is the measure of eternal natures, and every time is the measure of things in time; and these are the only two measures of life and motion in beings. For every thing which measures, either measures according to a part, or it measures the whole at once when it is adapted to that which is measured. That which measures, therefore, according to the whole is eternity, but that which measures according to parts is time. Hence there are only two measures, the one of things eternal, but the other of things in time.
Proposition 55. Every thing which subsists in time, either subsists through the whole of time, or has its hypostasis once in a part of time. For if all progressions are through similitude, and things more similar to first natures subsist in union with them prior to those which are dissimilar, but it is impossible for things which are generated in a part of time to be conjoined with eternal natures—for, because they are generated they differ from first natures, which are self-subsistent, and as existing at one time they are separated from things which always exist, but the media between these are the things which are partly similar and partly dissimilar to them—this being the case, the medium between things which are at one time generated and those that exist always is either that which is always becoming to be, or that which is at one time, or that which is not truly being. It is, however, impossible it should be that which at one time only truly is. And that which is at one time not truly being is the same with that which is becoming to be: hence this is not the medium. It follows, therefore, that the medium between both is that which is always becoming to be, conjoined
Corollary. From these things it is evident that the perpetuity is two-fold, the one eternal, but the other temporal. The one likewise a stable, but the other a flowing perpetuity. And the one indeed has its being united, and the whole subsisting at once, but the other diffused and expanded according to temporal extension. And the one is a whole of itself, but the other consists of parts, each of which is separate, according to prior and posterior.
Proposition 56. Every thing which is produced by secondary natures is produced in a greater degree by prior and more causal natures, by whom those which are secondary were also produced. For if that which is secondary has the whole of its essence from that which is prior to it, its power of producing is also derived from thence,—for productive powers are essentially in producing causes, and give completion to the essence of them. But if it is allotted the power of producing from a superior cause, it will have from that its existence as the cause of things of which it is the cause, and its power of constituting other things will be measured from thence. If, however, this be the case, the things proceeding from it are effects through that which is prior to it. For the one perfects a cause, and the other the thing caused. But if this be so, the thing caused is from thence rendered such as it is.
Moreover, that it is likewise in a greater degree perfected from thence is evident. For if that which is first imparts to that which is second the cause of
Proposition 57. Every cause energizes prior to the thing caused, and constitutes more effects posterior to it. For so far as it is cause it is more perfect and more powerful than that which is posterior to it, and by reason of this is the cause of more effects. For it is the province of a greater power to produce more, of an equal power to produce equal, and of a less power to produce a less, number of effects. And the power which is able to effect greater things among similars is also capable of effecting those which are less. But that which is able to effect those which are less is not necessarily capable of producing those which are greater. If, therefore, the cause is more powerful, it is productive of more numerous effects.
Moreover, the effects which the thing caused is able to produce, the cause is in a greater degree able to produce. For every thing which is produced by secondary natures is in a greater degree produced by those which are prior and more causal. All things, therefore, which the thing caused is naturally able to produce coexist with and are produced by the cause. But if likewise it produces prior to it, it is indeed evident that it energizes prior to the thing caused, according to the energy which is productive of it. Every cause, therefore, energizes prior to the thing caused, and with it and posterior to
Corollary. Hence it is evident that of the things of which soul is the cause, intellect likewise is the cause; but that soul is not equally the cause of the things of which intellect is the cause. But intellect energizes prior to the soul. And the things which soul imparts to secondary natures, intellect likewise imparts in a greater degree: and when soul no longer energizes, intellect imparts by illumination the gifts of itself to those things to which soul does not impart herself. For that which is inanimate, so far as it participates of form participates of intellect, and the production of intellect.
22 See Proclus, On the Theology of Plato, 1.13. II.4. and III.7., where the conceptions of Parmenides, Plato, Plotinus and others on the subject are examined and unfolded.
Proposition 58. Every thing which is produced by many is more composite than that which is produced by fewer causes. For if every cause imparts something to that which proceeds from it, more causes will impart a greater number of gifts, but fewer causes a less number. Hence, of participants some will consist of a greater number of things, but others of a less number, of which each participates; some, indeed through a progression from a greater number of causes, but others from a less. Those, however, which proceed from a greater number of causes are more composite, but those from a less number of the same causes are more simple. Every thing, therefore, which is produced by a greater number of causes is more composite, but that which is produced by
Proposition 59. Every thing which is simple in essence is either better or worse than composite natures. For if the beings which are the extremes of things are produced by fewer and more simple causes, but those which are in the middle by a great number of causes, the latter indeed will be composites, but of the former some are more simple according to that which is better, but others according to that which is worse. That the extremes, however, are produced by fewer causes is evident, because the natures which are higher begin to produce prior to those which are subordinate, and extend beyond them to things to which subordinate natures do not proceed, through a diminution of power. Therefore the last of things, i.e., matter, is most simple, as well as the first of things, because it proceeds from the first alone. But, of these simplicities one is better than all composition, but the other according to that which is worse. And there is the same reasoning with respect to all things.
See Aristotle’s Metaphysics, VII. 17. and Plotinus: En. V. 3.13., En. IV. 7.2., En. VI. 2., 9, 10., and Proclus, On the Theology of Plato, VI. 11.
Proposition 60. Every thing which is the cause of many effects is better than that which is allotted a power of producing few, and which produces the parts of those things the wholes of which the other constitutes. For if the one is the cause of a few, but the other of many effects, but the former are parts of the latter, that which constitutes many effects will produce all that
Proposition 61. Every power which is impartible is greater, but when divided is less. For if it is divided it proceeds into multitude. And if this be so, it becomes more remote from The One. But because of this it is able to effect a fewer number of things, through departing from The One, which contains it, and will be imperfect, since the good of every thing consists in union.
Proposition 62. Every multitude which is nearer to The One is less in quantity than things more remote from it, but is greater in power. For that which is nearer to is more similar to The One. But The One constitutes all things without having any multitude in itself. Hence that which is more similar to it, since it is the cause of a greater number of effects, if The One is the cause of all things, will be more unical and more impartible and thereby resemble The One. As, therefore, that which is less multiplied is more allied to The One, so likewise, since it is allied
Corollary. From these things it is evident that there are more corporeal natures than souls; more souls than intellectual natures; and more intellects than divine unities. And there is the same reason or proportion in all other things.
Proposition 63. Every thing which is imparticipable constitutes two-fold orders of participated natures—one in things which occasionally participate, but the other in things which always and connascently participate. For that which is always participated is more similar to the imparticipable than that which is occasionally participated. Hence before the imparticipable establishes that which is occasionally it will establish that which is always participable, and which by being participated differs from that which is posterior to it, but by the always is more allied and more similar to the imparticipable. Nor are there alone things which are occasionally participated; for prior to these are the natures which are always participated, through which these also are bound to imparticipables according to a certain well-ordered progression. Nor are there alone things which are always participated. For these, possessing an inextinguishable power, since they are always, are prolific of other things which are occasionally participated, and as far as to these the diminution proceeds.
Corollary. From hence it is evident that of the unions proceeding from The One, and which illuminate beings, some are always but others occasionally participated. Intellectual participations, likewise, are in a similar manner twofold, as also are the animations of souls and the participations of other forms. For beauty, similitude, permanency, and sameness, since
24 See Plotinus’ book, On the Beautiful, (En. I. 6), chapters 1 and 2. This whole work is replete with wonderful insights, and will richly repay the deepest study. Additional Note: A revised reprint of Taylor’s translation of this book appeared in Vol. I. nos. 11 and 12 of The Platonist. and a new version by the late Prof. Thomas Davidson, a scholar of remarkable attainments, was published in no. 4 of the Bibliotheca Platonica. The best edition of the text is that by Creuzer, Heidelberg, 1814, with valuable and copious notes.
Proposition 64. Every archical monad constitutes a twofold number; one of self-perfect hypostases or natures, but the other of illuminations which possess their hypostasis in other things.
25 An ‘archical monad’ is one which has the relation of a principle to an entity. According to Butherus, (quoted by Stobaeus in Eclog. I. 5), “number is composed of monads. The monad is the principle and measure of beings, simple, unbegotten, perpetual, alone, pure, self-subsistent, the beginning and first nature.” All that is known of Butherus is that he was a Pythagorean of Cyzicus, a city of Mysia, Asia Minor, and that he flourished about the 4th century, B.C. Aside from the quotations preserved by Stobaeus, there is nothing extant of his writings.
The author of the Theologumena Arithmeticae, who was almost certainly Iamblichus, says that “the monad is the principle of number.” See the valuable Introductio Arithmetica of Nicomachus of Gerasa, I. 11. Also, Plotinus, On the Three Archical Hypostases, (En. V. 1.), Auxiliaries of Porphyry, No. 38. and Proclus, On the Theology of Plato, I. 3.
Taylor’s Theoretic Arithmetic, (London, 1816), contains an accurate and exhaustive exposition of the nature of the monad and numbers, drawn from ancient authorities, with the addition of original matter. It is the best work on the subject.
For if progression is according to diminution through things appropriate to producing causes, perfect natures will proceed from the all-perfect, and through these as media imperfect natures will proceed in a well-ordered progression, so that some will be self-perfect hypostases, but others will be imperfect. And the imperfect will become the forms of participants: for, because
Corollary. From these things it is evident that of the unities some are self-perfect proceeding from The One, but others are illuminations of unities and intellect. And some of them are self-perfect essences, but others are only the images of souls which are animated. And hence neither is every union a God—but this is true of a self-perfect unity alone—nor is every intellectual peculiarity an intellect, but an essential peculiarity alone is entitled to this appellation; nor is every illumination of soul a soul, but there are likewise images of souls.
Proposition 65. Every thing which subsists in any manner whatsoever, either subsists causally, having the form, of a principle, or according to hyparxis, or according to participation, iconically. For either that which is produced is seen in that which produces, as preexisting in cause, because every
26 By ὑπαρξις, hyparxis, in these Elements is meant that characteristic or summit of any nature through which it subsists, and in the Gods is the same with the unity and deity of their natures. And by ὑποστασις, hypostasis, is meant any individual nature, whether essential or super-essential, considered as something distinct and different from accident.–Taylor.
Proposition 66. All beings in relation to each other are either wholes or parts, or the same or different. For either some of them contain, but the others are contained, or they neither contain nor are contained. And they either experience something which is the same, as participating of one, or they are separated from each other. But if they contain they will be wholes, and if they are contained, parts. If, likewise, many things participate of one, they are the same according to one. But if they are alone many things, so far as they are many they will be different from each other.
Proposition 67. Every totality is either prior to parts, or consists of parts, or is in a part. For either the form of each thing is surveyed in its
Proposition 68. Every whole which is in a part is a part of that whole which consists of parts. For if it is a part, it is a part of a certain whole. And it is either a part of the whole which it contains, according to which it is said to be a whole in a part,—but thus it will be a part of itself, the part will be equal to the whole, and each will be the same,—or it will be a part of a certain other whole. And if of some other, it is either the only part of that, and thus again it will in no respect differ from the whole, being one part of one thing,—or it will be a part in conjunction with another part. For of every whole the parts are more than one, and that will be a whole of the many parts of which it consists. And thus the whole which is in a part is a part of the whole which consists of parts.
Proposition 69. Every whole which consists of parts participates of the wholeness which is prior to parts.
27 A totality or wholeness (ὁλοτης) is a whole which has a perpetual subsistence, and which comprehends in itself all the multitude of which it is the cause.–Taylor.
Of these four elements the constitution of the world took in the whole of each. Of the whole of Fire, Water, Air and Earth its Artificer fabricated it, leaving no part of any one of these nor any power of them outside: intending thereby, first, that the world should be an animal in the highest degree a perfect whole composed of perfect parts.–Plato: Timaeus, VII.
The doctrine of these perfect parts or wholes of the universe is of the first importance in the philosophy of Plato, and forms one of the grand articles of belief in the creed of the Platonic philosopher.–Taylor.
I believe that as the world considered as one great comprehending whole is a divine animal, so likewise every whole which it contains is a world, possessing in the first place a self-perfect unity proceeding from the ineffable, by which it becomes a god; in the second place, a divine intellect; in the third place, a divine soul; and in the last place, a deified body. That each of these wholes is the producing cause of all the multitude which it contains, and on this account is said to be a whole prior to parts, because considered as possessing an eternal form which holds all its parts together, and gives to the whole perpetuity of subsistence, it is not indigent of such parts to the perfection of its being. And that it follows by a geometrical necessity that these wholes which rank thus high in the universe must be animated.–Taylor.
See Plotinus: En. IV. 3. 2., and Proclus in Plat. Theol. pp. 111 sq. 155 sq. 221 sq.
Hence there is a certain form of wholeness
Proposition 70. Every thing which is more total is among principal causes, and prior to partial natures illuminates participants; and that which participates something remains secondary to principal causes. For it begins its activity in secondary natures prior to that which is posterior to it, and is present with the presence of it. When, likewise, that which is posterior to it no longer acts the more causal is still present, and continues to act. And this not only in different subjects but likewise in each of the natures which sometimes participate. Thus it is necessary, for instance, that being should be first generated, then animal, and then man. And man indeed is no more, if the rational power departs, but there is still animal, breathing and sentient. And, again, life failing, being remains. For
The cause, however, of this is, that the more causal nature, being more efficacious, acts prior to that which participates. For the thing caused experiences first that which is more powerful. And that which is secondary again acting, that which is more powerful acts with it. Because every thing which the secondary nature produces, that which is more causal produces likewise in conjunction with it. And if the former fails, the latter is still present. For the communication of the more powerful cause, operating in a greater degree, leaves last that which participates it. For through the communication of the secondary nature it corroborates its own illumination.
28 See the very valuable and profound work of Plotinus, On the Nature of Living itself and on the Nature of Man, (En. I. 1.) My translation of this book was printed in Vol. IV. Nos. 5 and 6 of The Platonist. See, further, Plotinus: En. VI. 1. and En. VI. 6. 9.; Damascius Περι των Πρωτων Αρχων, p. 69, ed. Ruelle, Paris, 1899; and Syrianus in Aristot. Metaphys. II. p. 46, ed. Kroll, Berlin, 1902.
Of the massive treatise of Damascius, Doubts and Solutions concerning First Principles, “which has preserved a most valuable store of recondite wisdom, and unfolded some of the sublimest mysteries of the ancient theology,” unfortunately there is no English translation. In No. 2 of the Bibliotheca Platonica I began the publication of an English version, preceded by a biographical and bibliographical introduction, but only six chapters appeared. As I have said elsewhere, he alone who is able to rise above sensuous perceptions, and cognize universals, can comprehend and appreciate this work.
The Commentary of Syrianus on the II. III. XII. and XIII. books of the Metaphysics of Aristotle, an exposition of great learning and subtle reasoning, awaits a translation into any language other than the Latin. Parts of it however were translated by Taylor, in his notes to Aristotle’s Metaphysics. It is an absolute and complete refutation of all the objections, apparent or otherwise, urged by Aristotle and the Peripatetics against the Platonic doctrines, especially that of Ideas.
Proposition 71. All things which are among principal causes, since they possess a more universal and higher order in their effects, according to the illuminations proceeding from them, become in a certain respect subject to the communications of more partial causes. And the illuminations indeed from higher causes receive the progressions from secondary causes; but the latter are established in the former. And thus some participations precede others, and some representations extend after others, beginning from on high, to the same subject, more total causes having a prior activity, but those which are more partial supply ing their participants with their communications, posterior to the activities of more total causes. For if more causal natures act prior to those which are secondary on account of exuberance of power, and are present to those which have a more imperfect aptitude, and likewise illuminate them; but things more subordinate and secondary in rank are supplied from those which are more causal, it is evident that the illuminations of superior natures antecedently comprehend that which participates of both of these, and give stability to the communications of things subordinate. But these illuminations of superior causes employ the resemblances of subordinate natures as foundations, and operate on that which participates of them, the superior causes themselves having a prior activity.
Proposition 72. All things which in their participants have the relation of a subject proceed from more perfect and total causes. For the causes of a greater number of effects are more powerful and total, and are nearer to The One, than the causes of fewer effects. But the natures which constitute the things which are antecedently the subjects
Corollary. From hence it is evident why matter which derives its subsistence from The One is of itself destitute of form: and why body, though it participates of being, is of itself destitute of soul. For matter, since it is the subject of all things, proceeds from the cause of all; but body, because it is the subject of animation, derives its subsistence from that which is more universal than soul, because it participates in a certain respect of being.
29 By matter proceeding from the cause of all, nothing more is meant than that it depends entirely on the First Cause for its shadowy and unreal subsistence: for, as the emanations of causes are extended in proportion to their eminence, hence the processions of the one extend beyond those of every other cause, and even leave faint traces of their illuminations in the dark receptacle of matter.–Taylor.
See Plotinus: En. II. 4., which discusses the nature of matter most acutely and satisfactorily; Auxiliaries of Porphyry, Nos. 21. 28. and 29.; and Tholuck’s Ssufismus Sive Theosophia Persarum Pantheistica.
Proposition 73. Every whole is at the same time a certain being and participates of being, but not every being is a whole. For either being and whole are the same, or the one is prior but the other posterior. If, however, a part so far as it is a part is being, (for a whole is from parts which have a being), yet it is not of itself likewise a whole. Being, therefore, and whole are not the same: for if this were the case, a part would be a nonentity. But if a part was a nonentity, the whole would not exist. For every whole is a whole of parts, either as existing prior to them, and therefore causally containing them in
Corollary. From these things it is evident that being is primarily beyond wholeness. For the one indeed, viz. being, is present to a greater number of things; since being is present to parts, so far as they are parts. But the other, viz. wholeness, is present to a less number of things. For that which is the cause of a greater number of effects is more excellent; but the cause of a less number is of a subordinate nature, as has been demonstrated.
Proposition 74. Every form is a certain whole; for it consists of many things, each of which completes the form. But not every whole is a form. For a particular thing is an indivisible whole, but so far as it is indivisible it is not a form. For every whole consists of parts; but form is that which may be divided into individual forms. Whole, therefore, is one thing, and form another. And the one is present to many things, but the other to a few. Hence whole is above the forms of beings.
Corollary. From these things it is evident that whole has a mediate order between being and forms. And hence it follows that being subsists prior to forms, and that forms are beings, but that not every being is a form. Whence likewise privations in the effects of causes are in a certain respect beings, but are no longer forms,
30 Thus matter possesses a certain obscure image of being, but does not preserve the most debile impression of form. For as the gradations of being are more extended than those of form, and as matter is the last of things, hence matter may be said to retain the footstep of being in its dark receptacle, whilst the processions of form are reflected like echoes from its rebounding seat.–Taylor.
Proposition 75. Every cause which is rightly so called is exempt from, its effect. For if it is in the effect it either imparts completion to it, or is in a certain respect indigent of it in order to its existence, and thus it will be more imperfect than the thing caused. For being in the effect it is rather a con-cause than a cause, and is either a part of that which is generated, or an instrument of the maker. For that which is a part in the thing generated is more imperfect than the whole. The cause, likewise, which is in the effect is an instrument of generation to the maker, being unable to define of itself the measures of production. Every cause, therefore, which is rightly so denominated, if it is more perfect than that which proceeds from it, imparts to its effect the measure of generation, and is exempt from instruments and elements, and, in brief, from every thing which is called a con-cause.
Proposition 76. Every thing which proceeds from an immovable cause has an immutable hyparxis: but every thing which proceeds from a movable cause has a mutable hyparxis. For if that which makes is entirely immovable, it does not produce that which is second from itself through motion, but by its very being. If, however, this be the case, it has that which proceeds from it concurrent with its own essence. And if this be so, it will
Proposition 77. Every thing which is in capacity or power proceeds from, that which is in activity: and that which is in capacity proceeds to that which is in activity. That likewise which is in a certain respect in capacity, so far as it is in capacity, is the offspring of that which is in a certain respect in activity: but that which is all things in capacity proceeds from that which is all things in activity.
31 See the “classical place” of Aristotle’s Metaphysics, VIII. 5.; the book of Plotinus, On that which is in capacity and activity, (En. II. 5); and the dictum of Proclus (Plat. Theol. II. 4.): “for every activity is the progeny of power.”
For that which is in capacity is not naturally competent to bring itself into activity, because it is imperfect. For, since it is imperfect, if it should become the cause to itself of perfection, and this in activity, the cause will be more imperfect than that which is produced by it. Hence that which is in capacity, so far as it is in capacity, will not be the cause to itself of a subsistence in activity. For, on this hypothesis, so far as it is imperfect, it would be the cause of perfection;
Proposition 78. Every power is either perfect or imperfect. For the power which is prolific of activity is perfect, because it makes other things to be perfect through its own activities. That, however, which is perfective of other things is in a greater degree perfect, because it is more self-perfect. But the power which is indigent of another which pre-exists in activity, according to which indigence it is something in capacity, is imperfect. For it is indigent of the perfection which is in another, in order that by participating of it, it may become perfect. Hence such a power as this is of itself imperfect. So that the power of that which is in energy is perfect, because it is prolific of energy: but the power of that which is in capacity is imperfect, because it derives its perfection from the power which is in activity.
Proposition 79. Every thing which becomes, becomes from a twofold power. For it is requisite that the thing which becomes
Proposition 80. Every body of itself is naturally adapted to be passive, but every thing incorporeal to act. One, indeed, is essentially inefficacious, but the other is impassive. That which is incorporeal, however, may become passive by its association with the body; just as bodies are able to act through the participation of incorporeals. For body so far as it is body is alone divisible, and through this becomes passive, being entirely partible, and this to infinity. But that which is incorporeal, be cause it is simple, is impassive. For neither is that which is impartible capable of being divided, nor can that be changed in quality which is not a composite. Either, therefore, nothing will be effective, or this must be affirmed of an incorporeal nature; since body, so far as it is body does not act, because it is alone liable to be divided and to be acted upon. For every thing which acts has an effective power; so that body, so far as it is body, will not act but so far as it contains in itself a power of acting. But body is essentially inefficacious and impotent, and hence when it acts it acts through the participation of power. Moreover, incorporeal natures becoming in bodies, participate of passions and various
32 See Aristot. Metaphys. II. 4. IV. 2.; De Anima, II. 1.; De Generat. et Corrupt. 1. 2. 1. 5.; Plotinus: En. II. 4. 6., En. II. 7. 2., En. IV. 7. 1.; Porphyrii Sententt. cap. 19-29; Proclus in Plat. Theol. II. 12. Wyttenbach, in his edition of the Phaedo, (pp. 195-198), has some excellent observations on the subject.
Proposition 81. Every thing which is participated separably, is present to its participant by a certain inseparable power which it imparts to it. For if it is itself present to the participant in a separate manner, and is not in it, as if it possessed its subsistence in it, a certain medium between the two is necessary, connecting the one with the other, and which is more similar to that which is participated, and subsists in the participant. For if this medium is separable, how can it be participated by the participant, since the participant neither contains the medium nor any thing proceeding from it? A power and illumination therefore proceeding from that which is separable into the participant, conjoins both. Hence one of these will be that through which the participation is effected, another will be that which is participated, and another that which participates.
Proposition 82. Every thing incorporeal, since it is revertible to itself, when it is participated by other things is participated in a separable manner. For, if in an inseparable manner, the activity of it would not be separate from its participant, nor likewise its essence. If, however, this were, the case, it would not return to itself. For, if it returns, it will be separate
Proposition 83. Every nature which is gnostic of itself is able to return wholly to itself. For, knowing itself it is evident that it returns to itself in activity. For the knower and that which is known are one. And the knowledge of itself returns to itself as to that which is known. This knowledge, likewise, since it belongs to the knower, is a certain activity; but it is an activity of itself returning to itself, because it is able to know itself. Moreover, that it returns to itself essentially, if through activity, has been demonstrated. For every nature which by action or energizing returns to itself has likewise an essence verging to and subsisting in itself.
Proposition 84. Every nature which always is possesses an infinite power. For if its hypostasis is never failing, the power likewise according to which it is that which it is, and is able to exist, is infinite. For if the power of existing was finite, it would sometime or other fail. But this failing, the existence also of that which possesses it would fail, and it would no longer be that which always is. It is necessary, therefore, that the power of that which always is, and which connects and contains it essentially, should be infinite.
Proposition 85. Every nature which is always becoming to be, possesses an infinite power of becoming to be. For if it is always rising into existence, the power
Proposition 86. Every nature which is truly being is infinite, neither through multitude nor through magnitude, but by power alone. For every infinite is either in discrete, or in continued quantity, or in power. But that which always is, is infinite, by reason of having an inextinguishable life, a never-failing hyparxis, and an undiminished activity. But it is neither infinite on account of magnitude,—for that which is truly being is without magnitude, being self-subsistent, since every nature self-subsistent is impartible and simple,—nor is it infinite on account of multitude, for it has in the most eminent degree the form of The One, because it is most proximate and most allied to it. But it is infinite according to power, and hence it is likewise impartible and infinite: and the more it is one and impartible, the more it is infinite. For the power which is divided becomes imbecile and finite, and powers which are entirely divided are in every respect finite. For ultimate powers, and which are most remote from The One, are in a certain respect finite, on account of their distribution into parts. But primary powers, on account of their impartibility, are infinite—for a separation into parts divulses and dissolves the power of every thing—but impartibility, compressing and contracting that which it contains, renders it never-failing and undiminished in itself.
Moreover, infinity according to magnitude, and
33 For the sources of this Proposition, see the Philebus of Plato, especially pp. 24, 158; Aristot. Metaphys. X. 10.; Plotinus: En. II. 4. 14.; Porphyrii Sententt. cap. 33 et 36.; and Proclus in Theol. Plat. II. 1. IV. 31 sqq.
Proposition 87. Every eternal nature is being, but not every being is eternal. For the participation of being is present in a certain respect to generated natures, so far as each of these is not that which in no respect is. But if that which becomes is not entirely deprived of being, it is in a certain respect being. The eternal, however, is in no respect whatever present to generated natures, and especially not to those which do not even participate of the perpetuity which subsists according to the whole of time. Moreover, every thing eternal always is. For it participates of eternity, which imparts to the natures by which it is participated to be always that which they are. Being, therefore, is participated by a greater number of things than eternity: and hence being is beyond eternity. For by those natures by whom eternity is participated, being is likewise participated: but not every thing which participates
Proposition 88. Every nature which is truly being is either prior to eternity, or in eternity, or participates of eternity. That there is true being prior to eternity, has been demonstrated. But true being is likewise in eternity: for eternity possesses the always in union with being. And every nature which is eternal has both the being and always by participation. Eternity, however, possesses the always primarily, but being by participation. But Being itself is primarily being.
Proposition 89. Every nature which is truly being consists of bound and infinity. For if it has infinite power, it is evident that it is infinite, and on this account is constituted of the in finite. If likewise it is impartible, and unical, through this it participates of bound: for that which participates of unity is bounded. Moreover, it is impartible, and therefore possesses infinite power. Hence every thing which is truly or primarily being is constituted of bound and infinity.
Proposition 90. The first bound and the first infinity subsist by themselves, prior to every thing which is constituted of bound and the infinite. For if beings which subsist by themselves are prior to those which are certain beings, because they are common to all essences and principal causes, and not the causes of certain, but in brief of all beings, it is necessary that the first bound and the first infinity should be prior to that which is constituted of both of these. For
Proposition 91. Every power is either finite or infinite. But every finite power emanates from infinite power: and infinite power emanates from the first infinity. For the powers which exist at a certain time are finite, falling from the infinity of existing always: but the powers of eternal beings are infinite, because they never desert their own hyparxis.
Proposition 92. Every multitude of infinite powers depends on one first infinity, which is not a participated power, nor does it subsist in things which are endued with power, but by and of itself; not being the power of a certain participant, but the cause of all beings. For though the first being possesses power, yet it is not power itself: for it likewise has bound. But the first power is infinity: because infinite powers are infinite through the participation of infinity. Infinity itself, therefore, will be prior to all powers, through which being likewise has infinite power, and all things participate of infinity. For infinity is not the first, or the ineffable principle of all, since that is the measure of all things, because it is The Good and The One. Nor is infinity being: for this is infinite, but not infinity itself. Hence infinity subsists between that which is first and being itself, and is the cause of all infinite powers and of all the infinity which is in beings.
Proposition 93. Every infinite which is in true beings is neither infinite to superior natures, nor is it infinite to itself. For that by which each thing is infinite, by this likewise it exists uncircumscribed. But every thing which is in true beings is bounded by itself, and by all the things prior to it. It follows, therefore, that the infinite which is in true beings is infinite to subordinate natures alone, above which it is so expanded in power that it is incomprehensible by all of them. For in whatever manner they may extend themselves towards this infinite, yet it has something entirely exempt from them. And though all things enter into it, yet it has something occult and incomprehensible by secondary natures. Though likewise it evolves the powers which it contains, yet it possesses something on account of its union insurmountable, contracted, and surpassing the evolution of beings. Since, however, it contains and bounds itself, it will not be infinite to itself, nor much less to the natures above it, since it has a portion of the infinity which is in them. For the powers of more total or universal natures are more infinite because they are more universal, and rank nearer to the first infinity.
34 The reader must not be surprised to find that among infinities some are more infinite than others. For as among beings some are truer than others, and possess more of real being in proportion as they approach nearer to Being itself,—at the same time that they are all in a certain respect beings—so infinites possess more of infinity as they approach nearer to the Infinite itself. Thus, for instance, Eternity possesses infinity more truly than time, though time also is infinite; because the infinity of Eternity is a stable, indivisible life, but the infinity of time consists in an unceasing progression, or as it were an unwearied pursuit of infinity, which it can alone obtain in an extended and partible manner. And this difference among infinites extends even to matter itself, which is the most degraded and abject of all infinities, because it is infinite only in the most dormant capacity.–Taylor.
Proposition 94. Every perpetuity is indeed a certain infinity, but not every infinity is a perpetuity. For there are many infinities which have the infinite not on account of the always,—such, for instance, as the infinity according to magnitude, the infinity according to multitude, and the infinity of matter: and whatever else there may be of the like kind which is infinite, either because it cannot be passed over, or through the indefiniteness of its essence. That perpetuity, however, is a certain infinity is evident: for that which never fails is infinite. But this is that which always has an inexhaustible hypostasis or nature. Infinity, therefore, is prior to perpetuity. For that which constitutes a greater number of effects, and is more universal, is more causal. Hence the first infinity is beyond eternity, and infinity itself is prior to eternity.
35 On the Infinite and Infinity, see Plotinus: En. II. 4.
Proposition 95. Every power which is more single is more infinite than that which is multiplied. For if the first infinity is nearest to The One, of powers that power which is more allied to The One is in a greater degree infinite than that which recedes from it. For, being multiplied, it loses its uniform nature, abiding in which it possessed a transcendency with respect to other powers, because it was contained therein by reason of its impartibility. For in partible natures themselves the powers when congregated are united; but when divided they are increased in number, and become obscured.
Proposition 96. The power of every finite body, which is infinite, is incorporeal. For if it was corporeal, if this body indeed is finite, the infinite will be contained in the finite. But if the body is infinite, it will not be power so far as it is body. For if so far as it is body it is finite, but power is infinite, it will not be power so far as it is body. Hence the power which is infinite in a finite body is incorporeal.
Proposition 97. Every archical cause in each series or causal chain imparts to the whole series its characteristic; and that which the cause is primarily, the series is according to diminution.
Read the full explanation of The Cause of All (Proposition 97 diagram) here.
36 “But as there are many genera of Gods emanating from the power of Zeus, the father of all, truly each is allotted a place in the Homeric chain, and all are referred to Zeus and all depend on him, who is a much more beautiful chain than that golden one, or any other which one may imagine.”–Aristides: Oration I. p. 6, Vol. I. ed. Dindorf.
“Try me if such be your will: all ye Gods join together and prove me!
Letting the golden chain—that encompasses all—from the heavens,
Down; and with strength united, attempt, if ye can, to subvert me!
Vain were the fruitless toil: strive all as ye may, ye succeed not:
Zeus is the highest still—despite your attempts to remove him!
But, if I will to move, without effort I drag you before me;
Drag you aloft with ease, wide earth and the depths of the ocean;
Binding the links of the chain to a peak of the mighty Olympus:
Leaving the chain, and all, in the firmament swinging before me.
Such, and so strong, do I rule: over Gods as I rule over mortals.”
–Homer: The Iliad, VIII. 18-26 (Dart’s translation).
For if it is the leader of the whole series, and all coordinate natures are co-arranged with reference to it, it is evident that it imparts to all in the series the one idea according to which they are placed in that series. For either all things partake of similitude to this cause without a cause, or that which is the same in all emanates from it. But that the participation should be without a
Proposition 98. Every separate cause is at one and the same time everywhere and nowhere. For by the impartance of its own power it is every where. For this is a cause which replenishes the natures which are naturally adapted to participate of it, rules over all secondary beings, and is present to all things by the prolific progressions of its illuminations. But by an essence unmingled with things in place, and by its exempt purity, it is nowhere. For if it is separate, it is established above all things. In a similar manner, likewise, it is in no one of the natures inferior to itself. For if it was alone everywhere, it would not indeed be prevented from being a cause, and from subsisting in all its participants: but it would not be prior to all of them in a separate manner. If likewise it was nowhere without being everywhere, it would not indeed be prevented from being prior to all things, and from
And it is not indeed partly everywhere and partly nowhere. For thus it would be divulsed and separate from itself, if one part of it was everywhere in all things, but another was nowhere and prior to all things. But the whole of it is everywhere, and in a similar manner nowhere. For the things which are able to participate of it meet with the whole of it, and find the whole present to themselves, while at the same time it is wholly exempt from them. For the participant does not place this separate cause in itself, but participates of it to the extent of its capacity. Nor by the impartance of itself does it become contracted by the multitude of the participations of it: for it is separate. Nor do its participants participate of it defectively; for that which imparts is everywhere.
Proposition 99. Every imparticipable, so far as it is imparticipable, is not constituted by another cause. But it is itself the principle and cause of all its participants: and thus every principle in each causal chain is unbegotten. 
(Read the full explanation of The One Imparticipable (Proposition 99 diagram) here.)
37 Hence as all things proceed from The Ineffable that which is imparticipable proceeds also from it, yet not as from a cause, but as from that which is better than cause. The procession, therefore, of the imparticipable from the Ineffable is αρρητος εκαρανσις an ineffable evolution into light.–Taylor.
For if it is imparticipable in its own series or chain
38 See Plotinus: En. V. 5. 9 sq; En. VI. 9. 4 sq.
Proposition 100. Every chain of wholes is extended to an imparticipable cause and principle: but all imparticipables depend on the one principle of all things.
39 See Plotinus: En. V. 3. 12 sq.
Proposition 101. Imparticipable intellect is the leader of all things which participate of intellect, imparticipable life of all things which participate of life, and imparticipable being of all things which participate of being. And of these, being is prior to life, but life is prior to intellect. For because in each causal chain of beings imparticipables are prior to things which are participated, it is necessary that intellect should be prior to intellectuals, that life should be prior to vital natures, and that being itself should be prior to beings. Because however that which is the cause of more effects precedes that which is the cause of fewer, hence among these being will be the first; for it is present to all things to which life and intellect are present. For every thing which lives and participates of intelligence necessarily is, but not vice versa. For many beings neither live, nor energize intellectually. But life is the second. For all things which participate of intellect participate likewise of life, but not vice versa. For many things indeed live, but are destitute of knowledge. And intellect is the third. For every thing which is in any manner whatsoever gnostic, likewise lives and is. If therefore being is the cause of more effects, but life of fewer, and intellect of still fewer, being is the first in the causal order, life the second, and intellect the third.
40 Compare Aristot. De Anima I. 5. III. 4. et Joan. Philoponi Com. Prooemium; Plotinus: En. V. 5. 1 sq., En. VI. 5. 5 sq.; Proclus in Plat. Theol. I. 25, II. 11.; Porphyrii Sententt. cap. XV. sqq.; Iamblichus De Mysteriis Aegyptt. I. 7 et Galeus in notis p. 190.
Proposition 102. All beings which exist in any manner whatsoever consist of bound and the infinite through that which is primarily being. But all living beings are motive or active of themselves through the first life. And all gnostic beings participate of knowledge through the first intellect. For if that which is imparticipable in each causal chain imparts its own characteristic to all the natures under the same chain, it is evident that the first being likewise imparts to all things both bound and infinity, since it is itself primarily mixed from these. Life likewise imparts to all things the motion or activity which it possesses in itself. For life is the first progression and motion from the stable hypostasis or nature of being. And intellect imparts knowledge to all things: for the summit of all knowledge is in intellect, and intellect is the first gnostic nature.
Proposition 103. All things are in all, but each is appropriately in each. For in being there are life and intellect; and in life being and thought; and in intellect being and life. But in intellect, indeed, all things subsist intellectually, in life vitally, and in being all things are truly beings. For since every thing subsists either according to cause, or according to hyparxis, or according to participation; and since in the first the others are according to cause; in the second the first is according to participation, and the third according to cause; and in the third the natures prior to it are according to participation,—this being the case, life and intellect have a prior or causal subsistence in being. Since, however, each thing is characterized according to hyparxis, and neither according to cause (for cause deals with effects,) nor according to participation (for that is external of which a thing participates,)
Proposition 104. Every thing which is primarily eternal has both an eternal essence and activity. For if it primarily participates of the perpetuity of eternity, it does not partially participate of it, but entirely. For either it participates of it in activity, but not in essence. This however is impossible: since in this case energy would be more excellent than essence. Or, it participates of it according to essence, but does not participate of it according to activity. In this case, however, that which is primarily eternal, and that which primarily participates of time, will be the same. And time, indeed, will primarily measure the essence of certain things, but eternity which is more excellent than all time will not measure the essence of any thing, if that which is primarily eternal is not essentially contained by eternity. Hence every thing which is primarily eternal has both an eternal essence and activity.
Proposition 105. Every thing immortal is perpetual; but not every thing perpetual is immortal. For if the immortal is that which always participates of life, but that which always participates of life participates likewise of being, and that which always lives always
41 See Aristot. Topic c. IV. 5. et VI. 3.; Plotinus En. III. 1. 1 sq., En. III. 7. 1 sq.; Platonis Phaedon. p. 105 D, and annotation of Wyttenbach, p. 280 sqq.
Proposition 106. Between every thing which is entirely eternal both in essence and activity, and every thing which has its essence in time, the medium is that which is partly eternal and partly measured by time. For that which has its essence comprehended by time is entirely temporal, and by a much greater priority this will be allotted a temporal activity. But that which is entirely temporal is in every respect dissimilar to that which is entirely eternal. But all causal progressions are through similars. Hence there is something between these. The medium, therefore, is either that which is eternal in essence, but temporal in activity, or vice versa. This latter, however, is impossible: for in that case activity would be more excellent than essence.
Proposition 107. Every thing which is partly eternal and partly temporal is at one and the same time being and generation. For every thing eternal is being, and that which is measured by time is generation: so that if the same thing participates of time and eternity, yet not according to the same, it will be both being and generation, but not both according to one of these alone.
Corollary. From these things it is evident that generation, indeed, having a temporal essence depends on that which partly partakes of being and partly of generation, participating at once of eternity and time. But this is related to that which is in every respect eternal: and that which is in every respect eternal is related to being which is prior to the eternal.
42 As to the argument, see Platonis Timaeum p. 27 sq.; Aristot. De Generat. et Corrupt. I. 3.; Plutarch, advers. Colotem, p. 547 sq. Wyttenb. et Porphyrii Sententt. cap. 13. et 14.
Proposition 108. Every thing which is partial in each order is able to participate in a twofold respect of the monad which is in the proximately superior order, viz. either through its own wholeness, or through that which is partial in the superior order and coordinate with the thing according to an analogy to the whole causal chain. For if the return to all things is through similitude, that which is partial in an inferior order is dissimilar to that which is monadic and a whole in a superior order; and is as that which is partial to a whole, and as one order to another. But a partial nature is similar to a whole of the same causal chain through a
Proposition 109. Every partial or particular intellect participates of the Primal Unity which is above intellect, both through the Universal Intellect and through the partial unity which is coordinate with it. And every partial soul participates of Universal Intellect through Universal Soul, and through a partial intellect. And every partial nature of body participates of Universal Soul through Universal Nature, and a partial soul. For every thing partial participates of the monad which is in a superior order, either through its characteristic wholeness (universality) or through that which is partial in that order, and which is coordinate with the partial nature.
43 As to the argument, see Plotinus: En. VI. 2. 4. sqq., and Proclus in Plat. Theol. II. 1.
Proposition 110. Of all the things which are arranged in each causal chain, those which are first and are conjoined with their mo nad are able to participate of the natures which are proximately established in the superior causal chain through analogy. But those which are more imperfect and remote from their proper principle are not naturally adapted to enjoy these natures. For because the things which are first are allied to
Proposition 111. Of every intellectual causal chain some are divine intellects, receiving the participations of the Gods; but others are intellects alone. And of every psychical chain some are intellectual souls, which depend on their proper intellects; but others are souls alone.
44 See Plat. Phaedr. p. 247 sq.; Hermiae Commentar. p. 134 sqq. ed. Couvreur; Aristot. De Anima III. 4. cum Jo. Philoponi Commentar.; Plotinus: En. IV. 1.; Proclus in Plat. Tim. p. 74 sq. et Porphyrii Sententt. cap. I-XI.
Neither, therefore, is every intellect attached to a deity, but those intellects only which are supreme and most single: for
Proposition 112. Of every order those things which are primal have the form of the natures prior to them. For the highest genera in each order are conjoined through similitude to the natures which are above them, and through the connexion of the progression of wholes the subject are conjoined to the superior natures. Hence such as the superior natures are primarily, such likewise is the form which these highest genera are allotted, and which is cognate to the nature of those in the superior order. Likewise they appear to be, through the characteristic of their subsistence, such as the natures which are prior to them.
Proposition 113. Every divine number is unical. For if a divine number has a precedaneous {earlier} cause, viz. The One, just as an intellectual number has intellect, and a psychical number soul, and if multitude is everywhere analogous to its cause, it is evident that a divine number is unical, since The One is God. But this follows, since The One and The Good are the same: for The Good and God are the same. For that beyond which there is nothing, and which all things desire, is God. And likewise that from which all things proceed, and to which all things tend, is The Good. If therefore there is a multitude of Gods, the multitude is
45 See Plotinus: En. V. Lib, I. 5.; Porphyrii Sententt. cap. 38.; Proclus in Plat. Theolog. Lib. IV. 29; Theologumena Arithmeticae, p. 4 sq. ed. Ast.; Jo. Laur. Lydus De Mensibus, Lib. II. cap. 4., and Additional Notes: To such as understand these Elements this argument for the existence of a multitude of Gods is perfectly demonstrative and clear. Indeed as every production of nature possesses the power of generating its similar, it is much more necessary that the First Cause of all should generate a multitude the most similar to himself that can possibly be conceived. For every being produces that which is similar prior to the dissimilar; as indeed a contrary mode of proceeding would be absurd and impossible. The immediate or first productions therefore of the First God must be a multitude of Gods—or otherwise his first progeny would not be perfectly similar to himself. Nor does this doctrine in any respect derogate from the dignity of the Supreme God, as the ignorant suppose, but on the contrary tends to exalt his majesty and evince the ineffable beneficence and perfection of his nature. For though it establishes a multitude of Gods, yet it teaches that they are dependent on the First, who is perfectly incomprehensible and without participation. So that it leads us to consider the subordinate Deities as so many lesser luminaries shining before the presence of the Sun of good, and encircling with awful grandeur his ineffable radiance and occult retreats. And that this doctrine fully displays his superlative goodness is sufficiently manifest, since by a contrary assertion we must ascribe imperfection to the fountain of excellence, and leave Deity impotent and barren.–Taylor.
I rejoice in the opportunity which is afforded me of presenting the truly philosophic reader, in the present work, with a treasure of Grecian theology; of a theology which was first mystically and symbolically promulgated by Orpheus, afterwards disseminated enigmatically through images by Pythagoras, and in the last place scientifically unfolded by Plato and his genuine disciples. The peculiarity, indeed, of this theology is, that it is no less scientific than sublime; and that by a geometrical series of reasoning, originating from the most self-evident truths, it develops all the deified progressions from the Ineffable Principle of things, and accurately exhibits to our view all the links of that golden chain of which Deity is the one extreme, and body the other.
That, also, which is most admirable and laudable in this theology is, that it produces in the mind properly prepared for its reception the most pure, holy, venerable, and exalted conceptions of the Great Cause of all. For it celebrates this immense Principle as something superior even to being itself; as exempt from the whole of things, of which it is nevertheless ineffably the source, and does not therefore think fit to connumerate it with any triad, or order of beings. Indeed, it even apologizes for attempting to give an appropriate name to this Principle, which is in reality ineffable, and ascribes the attempt to the imbecility of human nature, which, striving intently to behold it, gives the appellation of the most simple of its conceptions to that which is beyond all knowledge and all conception. Hence it denominates it The One, and The Good; by the former of these names indicating its transcendent simplicity, and by the latter its subsistence as the object of desire to all beings. For all things desire good. At the same time, however, it asserts that these appellations are in reality nothing more than the parturitions of the soul, which, standing as it were in the vestibules of the adytum of Deity, announce nothing pertaining to the ineffable but only indicate her spontaneous tendencies towards it, and belong rather to the immediate offspring of the first God than to the First itself. Hence as the result of this most venerable conception of the Supreme, when it ventures not only to denominate the ineffable but also to assert something of its relation to other things, it considers this as pre-eminently its peculiarity, that it is the Principle of Principles; it being necessary that the characteristic property of principle, after the same manner as other things, should not begin from multitude, but should be collected into one monad as a summit, and which is the Principle of all principles. Conformably to this Proclus, in the second book of this work, says, with matchless magnificence of diction,—“Let us as it were celebrate the First God, not as es tablishing the earth and the heavens, nor as giving subsistence to souls, and the generations of all animals; for he produced these indeed but among the last of things; but prior to these let us celebrate him as unfolding into light the whole intelligible and intellectual genera of Gods, together with all the supermundane and mundane divinities—as the God of all Gods, the unity of all unities, and beyond the first adyta—as more ineffable than all silence, and more unknown than all essence,—as holy among the holies, and concealed in the intelligible Gods.”
The scientific reasoning from which this dogma is deduced is the following: As the Principle of all things is The One, it is necessary that the progression of beings should be continued, and that no vacuum should intervene either in incorporeal or corporeal natures. It is also necessary that every thing which has a natural progression should proceed through similitude. In consequence of this it is likewise necessary that every producing principle should generate a number of the same order with itself, viz. Nature, a natural number; Soul, one that is psychical; and Intellect, an intellectual number. For if whatever possesses a power of generating generates similars prior to dissimilars, every cause must deliver its own form and characteristic peculiarity to its progeny; and before it generates that which gives subsistence to progressions far distant and separate from its nature, it must constitute things proximate to itself according to essence, and conjoined with it through similitude. It is therefore necessary from these premises, since there is one unity the Principle of the universe, that this unity should produce from itself prior to every thing else a multitude of natures characterized by unity, and a number the most of all things allied to its cause; and these natures are no other than the Gods.
According to this theology, therefore, from the immense Principle of Principles, in which all things causally subsist, absorbed in super-essential light, and involved in unfathomable depths, a beauteous progeny of principles proceeds, all largely partaking of the Ineffable, all stamped with the occult characters of Deity, all possessing an overflowing fullness of good. From these dazzling summits, these ineffable blossoms, these divine propagations, Being, Life, Intellect, Soul, Nature and Body depend; Monads suspended from Unities, deified natures proceeding from Deities. Each of these Monads, too, is the leader of a series which extends from itself to the last of things, and which while it proceeds from at the same time abides in and returns to its leader. And all these principles and all their progeny are finally centered and rooted by their summits in the First, great, all-comprehending One. Thus all beings proceed from and are comprehended in the First Being; all intellects emanate from one First Intellect; all souls from one First Soul; all natures blossom from one First Nature; and all bodies proceed from the vital and luminous Body of the world. And, lastly, all these great monads are comprehended in the First One, from which both they and all their depending series are unfolded into light. Hence this First One is truly the Unity of unities, the Monad of monads, the Principle of principles, the God of Gods, one and all things, and yet one prior to all.
No objections of any weight, no arguments but such as are sophistical, can be urged against this most sublime theory, which is so congenial to the unperverted conceptions of the human mind that it can only be treated with ridicule and contempt in degraded, barren, and barbarous ages. Ignorance and priestcraft, however, have hitherto conspired to defame those inestimable works (viz. the present and other works of Proclus, together with those of Plotinus, Porphyry, Iamblichus, Syrianus, Ammonius, Damascius, Olympiodorus, and Simplicius), in which this and many other grand and important dogmas can alone be found; and the theology of the Greeks has been attacked with all the insane fury of ecclesiastical zeal, and all the imbecile flashes of mistaken wit, by men whose conceptions on the subject, like those of a man between sleeping and waking, have been turbid and wild, phantastic and confused, preposterous and vain.
Indeed, that after the great incomprehensible Cause of all a divine multitude subsists, co operating with this Cause in the production and government of the universe, has always been and is still admitted by all nations and all religions, however much they may differ in their opinions respecting the nature of the subordinate deities, and the veneration which is to be paid to them by man; and however barbarous the conceptions of some nations on this subject may be when compared with those of others.–Taylor.
Proposition 114. Every God is a self-perfect unity, and every self-perfect unity is a God. For if the number of unities is two fold, as has been demonstrated, and some are self-perfect, but others are illuminations from the self perfect unities, and if a divine number is allied to and connatural with The One and The Good, the Gods are self-perfect unities. And, vice versa, if there is a self-perfect unity it is a God. For as unity is in the most eminent degree allied to The One, and the self-perfect to The Good, so likewise according to both of these the self-perfect participates of the divine peculiarity and is a God. But if a God was a unity, yet not a self-perfect unity, or a self-perfect hypostasis, yet not a unity, he would be arranged in another order, on account of the mutation of the peculiarity.
Proposition 115. Every God is super-essential, super-vital, and superintellectual. For if each is a self-perfect unity, but neither essence, life, or intellect is a unity, but that which is united, it is evident that every God is beyond each of these, viz., essence, life, and intellect. For if these differ from each other, but all are in all, each of these being all will not be one only. Further, if the first God is super-
46 Additional Note: That the Principle of all things is something beyond Intellect and Being itself was asserted by the most ancient Pythagoreans, as well as by Plato and his best disciples, as the following citations will abundantly evince. And in the first place this is evident from a fragment of Archytas, a most ancient Pythagorean, On the Principles of things, preserved by Stobaeus, Eclog. Phys. (p. 280 Vol. I. ed, Wachsmuth. Taylor used an imperfect text. I have given the original of the passage as it appears in the latest and best edition, and corrected his translation accordingly), in which the following extraordinary passage occurs: ωστ’ αναγκα τρεις ειμεν τας απχας. ταν τε εστω των πραγματων και ταν μοεϕω και το εξ, αυτω κινατικου και τρατον τα δυναμι. το δε τοιτουτον ουνοον μονον ειμεν δει, αλλα και νοω τι κρεσσον. νοω δε κρεσσον εντι,οπερ ονομαϟομεν Θεον, ϕανερον.—i.e. “So that it is necessary that there be three principles, viz. that which is the substance of things (or matter), form, and that which is of itself motive, and primal in power. With respect to the last of which it is not only necessary that it should be intellect, but something better than intellect. But that which is better than intellect is evidently the same with that which we denominate God.” It must here however be observed that by the word god we are not only to understand the first cause but every god: for, according to the Pythagoric theology every deity, considered according to the characteristic of his nature, is superior to intellectual essence. Agreeably to the above passage is that also of Brotinus, as cited by Syrianus in Arist. Metaphys. (p. 166 ed. Kroll, Berol, 1902), who expressly asserts that the first cause νου παντος και ουσιας δυναμει και ππεσβεια υπερεχει—“surpasses” every intellect and essence both in power and dignity. Again, according to the same Syrianus, p. 168 (ed. Kroll), we are informed “that the Pythagoreans called God the one, as the cause of union to the universe, and on account of his superiority to every being, to all life, and to all-perfect intellect. But they denominated him the measure of all things, on account of his conferring on all things through illumination essence and bound; and containing and bounding all things by the ineffable super-eminence of his nature, which is extended beyond every bound.” And, again, this is confirmed by Clinius the Pythagorean, as cited by Syrianus, p. 168 (ed. Kroll): “That which is the one and the measure of all things is not only entirely exempt from bodies and mundane concerns, but likewise from intelligibles themselves, since he is the venerable principle of beings, the measure of intelligibles, ingenerable, eternal, and alone (μονον), possessing absolute dominion (κυριωδες), and himself manifesting himself (αυτο εαυτο δηλουν).” This fine passage I have translated agreeably to the manuscript corrections of the learned Gale, the original of which he has not inserted. To this we may likewise add the testimony of Philolaus who, as Syrianus informs us, p. 166, knew that cause which is superior to the two first elements of things, bound and infinite. For, says he, “Philolaus asserts that the deity established bound and infinite: by bound indeed exhibiting every coordination, which is more allied to the one, but by infinity a nature subjected to bound. And prior to these two principles he places one, and a singular cause, separated from the universality of things, which Archainetus denominates a cause prior to cause; but which, according to Philolaus, is the principle of all things.” To all these respectable authorities for the super-essential nature of the first cause, we may add the testimony of Sextus Empiricus himself. For in his books against the Mathematicians (p. 425) he informs us “that the Pythagoreans placed the one as transcending the genus of things which are essentially understood.” In which passage by ‘things which are essentially understood’ nothing more is meant than intelligible essences, as is obvious to every tyro in the Pythagoric philosophy.
But in consequence of this doctrine of the ancients concerning The One or the first principle of things, we may discover the meaning and propriety of those appellations given by the Pythagoreans to unity, according to Photius and others: such as αλαμπια, σκοτωδια, αμιξια, βαραθρον υποχθονιον Απολλων, etc., viz. obscurity or without illumination, darkness, without mixture, a subterranean profundity, Apollo etc. For, considered as ineffable, incomprehensible, and super-essential, he may be very properly called obscurity, darkness, and a subterranean profundity: but, considered as perfectly simple and one, he may with no less propriety be denominated without mixture and Apollo; since Apollo signifies a privation of multitude. “For (says Plotinus) the Pythagoreans denominated the first God Apollo, according to a more secret signification, implying a negation of many.” (Ennead. 5, lib. 5). To which we may add, that the epithets darkness and obscurity wonderfully agree with the appellation of a thrice unknown darkness, employed by the Egyptians, according to Damascius, in their most mystical invocations of the first God; and at the same time afford a sufficient reason for the remarkable silence of the most ancient philosophers and poets concerning this highest and ineffable cause.
This silence is indeed remarkably obvious in Hesiod, when in his Theogony he says: ητοι μεν πρωτιστα Χαος γενετ’. That is, “Chaos was the first thing which was generated”—and consequently there must be some cause prior to Chaos, through which it was produced; for there can be no effect witnout a cause. Such, however, is the ignorance of the moderns, that in all the editions of Hesiod γενετο is translated fuit, as if the poet had said that Chaos was the first of all things; and he is even accused by Cudworth on his account as leaning to the atheistical system. But the following testimonies clearly prove, that in the opinion of all antiquity γενετο was considered as meaning was generated, and not was simply. And in the first place, this is clearly asserted by Aristotle in lib. 3, De Coelo (p. 288, Oxford Edition). “There are certain persons who assert that there is nothing unbegotten, but that all things are generated…and this is especially the case with the followers of Hesiod.” And again, by Sextus Empiricus in his treatise Adversus Mathemat. p. 383, edit. Steph. who relates that this very passage was the occasion of Epicurus applying himself to philosophy. For (says he) when Epicurus was yet but a young man, he asked a grammarian, who was reading to him this line of Hesiod, “Chaos of all things was he first produc’d,” from what Chaos was generated, if it was the first thing generated. And upon the grammarian replying that it was not his business to teach things of this kind, but was the province of those who are called philosophers.—To those, then, says Epicurus, must I betake myself, since they know the truth of things.”
Simplicius, too, in commenting on the passage above cited from Aristotle, beautifully observes as follows: “Aristotle ranks Hesiod among the first physiologists, because he sings Chaos was first generated. He says, therefore, that Hesiod in a particular manner makes all things to be generated, because that which is first is by him said to be generated. But it is probable that Aristotle calls Orpheus and Musaeus the first physiologists, who assert that all things are generated, except the first. It is, however, evident that those theologists, singing in fabulous strains, meant nothing more by generation than the procession of things from their causes; on which account all of them consider the First Cause as unbegotten. For Hesiod also, when he says that Chaos was first generated, insinuates that there was something prior to Chaos, from which Chaos was produced. For it is always necessary that every thing which is generated should be generated from something. But this likewise is insinuated by Hesiod, that the first cause is above all knowledge and every appellation.” (Com. De Coelo, p. 251, ed. Karsten.)
Though the First Cause or The One itself confers on every thing a proper symbol of his ineffable nature, yet this occult unity or impression is not divine in things subject to generation and decay but in true essences alone, in the number of which rational souls must be ranked. Such of these however as are of a partial nature, and on this account are not the immediate progeny of the First One, do not contain a unity which can be called a god, because they are connected with motion, and are in a certain respect composite essences. But where there is a most true essence, as in separate intellects and celestial souls, the unity of each is a god. And indeed on account of these unities, which are as it were expressive characters of the First Unity, the essences of the Gods contain all things and extend their providential care to every part of the universe, with unbounded beneficence and immaculate power. But these divine unities are perpetually united to the First One, like rays to light, and lines to a center. They likewise subsist in the most perfect union with each other. For since union in other natures is effected through the power of unity, these divine unities must be much more closely united through their subsisting much nearer to the First and most perfect One. Every divine unity, therefore, though it is neither essence nor obnoxious to essential multitude, yet abides in essence,—or is rather the summit and as it were blossom of essence. And as every thing is established in its proper species through form, and as we derive our being through soul, so every god is a deity from the secret unity which he contains. Hence these divine unities subsist in the Intelligible World and in the essences of the Gods like so many splendid lamps in diaphanous spheres, mingling their rays with an ineffable union, energy and consent. And situated in most admirable order in the vestibule of The Good they occultly signify divine silence and solitary beauty, and perspicuously announce to posterior natures the awful sanctuary of their incomprehensible Cause.–Taylor.
Proposition 116. Every deity except The One is participable. For that The One is imparticipable is evident, since if it was participated, and thereby related to another, it would no longer be similarly the cause of all things, of both primary and secondary beings. But that the other unities are participated, we shall thus demonstrate. For if there is another imparticipable unity after the First, in what will it differ from The One? For either it subsists in the same manner as that; and in this case how is the one the second, but the other first? Or it does not subsist in the same manner: and thus one of these will be The
47 See Plotinus: En. V. 5. 12 sq., and Proclus in Plat. Theol. I. 19. II. 4.
Proposition 117. Every God is the measure of beings. For if every God is unical, he defines and measures all the multitude of beings. For all multitudes, since they are in their own nature indefinite, are bounded through The One. But that which is unical, measuring and determining the natures to which it is present, leads into bound that which by its own power is not bounded. For the unical has the form of The One by participapation. But that which is uniform recedes from indefiniteness and infinity: and the more uniform it is the less is it indefinite, and without measure. Every multitude of beings, therefore, is measured by the divine unities.
48 See the Theaetetus, p. 152 A; the Cratylus, p. 386 A; Aristot. Metaphys. III. 5., and Plotinus: En. VI. 8. 17.
The basis of this Proposition is Plato De Legg. IV. p. 716: “But God is specially to us the measure of all things—much more indeed than any man, according to the opinion of the vulgar.” Plato refers to the childish notion of Protagoras, which was an echo of the belief of the multitude, that “man is the measure of all things.” Proclus acutely observes: “the argument of Protagoras is this: if such as things appear to be to every man such they are, the wise will not exist, but only the foolish. But the second assertion is not true, neither therefore is the first.” (Scholia on the Cratylus, no. 38.) This and other equally irrational notions, such as “might makes right,” ought to have sunk into utter oblivion by reason of their essential absurdity, inanity and weakness, but they reappear even in this enlightened (?) century, branded as “new,” “up-to-date,” “scientific thought,” etc. The people who hold and disseminate these sensuous chimeras are ignorantly called “advanced thinkers.” In truth they are neither “advanced” nor “thinkers.” All their “thinking” is done on the animal plane. Unable to apprehend the eternal and immutable ideas, which are perennially fresh and ever valid, these philosophasters are reviving antiquated opinions which were exploded and refuted thousand of years ago.
Proposition 118. Every thing which is in the Gods pre-exists in them according to their peculiarities. And the peculiarity of the Gods is unical and super essential. Hence all things are contained in them unically and super-essentially. For if every thing subsists in a three-fold manner, viz. either according to cause, or according to hyparxis, or according to participation, but the first number of all things is the divine number, nothing will be in the Gods according to participation, but all things will subsist in them either according to hyparxis, or according to cause. The things, however, which they antecedently contain because they are the causes of all things, they antecedently contain in a manner appropriate to their own union. For every being which is the leader of secondary natures causally, contains the cause of things subordinate in a way naturally adapted to itself. All things, therefore, are in the Gods unically and super-essentially.
49 See Plotinus: En. VI. 8. 18 sqq.; Proclus in Plat. Theol. 1. 24. III. 1.; Porphyrii Sententt. cap. 38; Iamblichus De Mysteriis Aegyptt. VIII. 2.
Proposition 119. Every God subsists through its own super essential goodness, and is good neither through participation, nor through essence, but super-essentially; since habits and essences are allotted a secondary and remote order from the Gods. For if the first God is The One and The Good, and so far as he is The One he is likewise The Good, and so far as he is The Good he is likewise The One, if this be the case, every causal chain of the Gods is uniform and boniform according to one peculiarity, and each of the Gods is not a unity and goodness according to any other thing. But each so far as he is a unity is a goodness, and so far as he is a goodness is a unity. To the degree, likewise, that the Gods posterior to the first God proceed from the the First they are boniform and uniform, since the First is The One and The Good: but as Gods they are all unities and goodnesses.
As, therefore, the one of the Gods is super-essential, so likewise is their goodness, since it is no other than the one. For each of them is no other than the good, but is good alone; as neither is each any other than the one, but is one alone.
50 See Plotinus: En. I. 7. 1 sq.; Proclus in Plat. Theol. I. 15. I. 23.
Proposition 120. Every God has in his own essence a providence of the whole of things. And a providential activity is primarily in the Gods. For all other things which are posterior to the Gods, act providentially through the participation of them: but providence is connascent with the Gods. For
51 We may further infer the necessity of Providence in the Gods from considering that as they are the productive causes of all things, so all things abide and are radically established in their natures. For where can any thing subsist, which is not contained in their unknown and all-pervading comprehensions? But if this be the case, since all things are in reality the offspring of the Gods they must continually be the objects of their providential exertions. For as goodness is the characteristic of these divine natures, it is impossible that they should abandon their progeny, or cease to impart their beneficent, unenvying, and all-powerful communications. Nor must we think that these providential exertions are laborious to the Gods,—since, as Proclus well observes, (Theol. Plat. p. 41), “that which is according to nature is not laborious to any thing: for neither is it laborious to fire to impart heat, nor to snow to refrigerate, nor to bodies themselves to energize according to their peculiar powers. Nor, prior to bodies, is it laborious to natures themselves to nourish, or generate, or increase: for these are the works of natures. Nor again, prior to these, is it laborious to souls to exert their peculiar energies: for many of their energies are attended with delight, many are the result of their essence, and many motions are produced by their presence alone.” Hence if the communication of good naturally belongs to the Gods, Providence also is natural to these divinities, which they exert tn a tranquil, unpolluted, and incorporeal manner.
Should it be inquired in what manner Providence operates, the following beautiful passage from Proclus On the Parmenides, as cited by Ficinus in his commentary on that dialogue, will give us abundant satisfaction: “Let us conceive a ship agitated by the winds and waves, and let us suppose that the imagination of someone is so powerful that while he imagines the sea, the sea immediately flows; that while he imagines the ship, the ship is constructed; and that the winds and waves arise agreeable to his imagination, and as the consequences of its vehement energy. Now it is evident that such a one would not be compelled in surveying these particulars to employ a confused and distracted vision, but both his knowledge and operation would equally subsist in a uniform manner. And such is the simplicity of Divine Intelligence with respect to the intuition and fabrication of inferior concerns.”–Taylor.
Proposition 121. Every divine nature has for its essence goodness, but a unical power, and a knowledge arcane and incomprehensible by all secondary natures. For if it is provident of the whole of things, there is in it a power dominating the subjects of its providential activity; through which power, unsubdued and uncircumscribed by all things, divine natures fill all things with, and subject all things to, themselves. For every archical cause of other things, and which is dominative of them through abundance of power, rules and dominates according to nature.
The first power, therefore, is in the Gods, not indeed dominating some things but not others, but equally comprehending in itself primarily the powers of all beings, this power neither being essential nor much less unessential, but connascent with the hyparxis of the Gods, and super-essential. Moreover, the boundaries of all cognitions presubsist uniformly in the Gods. For through divine knowledge, which is exempt from the whole of things, all other cognitions subsist; which divine
52 Compare the Philebus, p. 64 sqq.; the Timaeus, p. 29 sq.; Plotinus: En. I. 7. 1. sq., En. V. 9. 2.; Proclus in Plat. Theol. V. 17.
Proposition 122. Every divine nature provides for secondary natures, and is exempt from the subjects of its providential care, providence neither remitting the pure and unical transcend-ency of that which is divine, nor a separate union abolishing providence. For divine beings abiding in their unical nature, and in their own hyparxis, fill all things with the power of themselves. And every thing which is able to participate of them enjoys the good which it is capable of receiving, according to the measures of its own hypostasis; divine natures in the mean time illuminating all things by their very being, or rather prior to being. For since they are no other than goodness, they supply without envy all things with an abundance of good, by their very being, not making a distribution according to a reasoning process; things receiving indeed according to their worth, and divine natures imparting according to their hyparxis. Neither, therefore, in providing
Proposition 123. Every divine nature is itself, by reason of its super-essential union, ineffable and unknown to all secondary natures; but it is comprehended and known by its participants. Hence that which is First is alone entirely unknown, be cause it is imparticipable. For all knowledge which arises through reasoning deals with beings, and in beings possesses the apprehension of truth, since it comes into contact with conceptions, and subsists in intellections. But the Gods are beyond all beings. Neither, therefore, is that which is divine the object of opinion, nor can it be apprehended by the dianoetic power, or by intellection. For every being is either sensible, and therefore the object
53 Compare Plotinus: En. VI. 8. 7 sq.; Porphyrii Sententt. cap. 26; Proclus in Plat. Theol. V. 28., and Commentary of Olympiodorus on the First Alcibiades, p. 133, ed. Creuzer.
The reader must remember that the Gods are alone super-essential through their unities, which are the characteristics of their natures: for as irrationality is the essential signature of a brute, and rationality of a man, so a divine unity is the invariable characteristic of a God.–Taylor.
Proposition 124. Every God knows partible natures impartibly, temporal natures without time, things which are not necessary necessarily, mutable natures immutably; and, summarily, all things in a manner more excellent than the order of things known. For if every thing which is with the Gods is with them according to their characteristic, it is evident that the knowledge in the Gods of things inferior will not subsist according to the nature of the inferior
54 For an unfolding of the argument of this Proposition see the Phaedrus, p. 247 and the Commentary of Hermeias; the Philebus, p. 61; Plotinus: En. V. 8. 4., En. VI. 7. 36; and Proclus in Plat. Theol. pp. 54, 282, 294, 306, 308.
Proposition 125. Every God, from that order from, which he began to unfold himself into light, proceeds through all secondary natures, always indeed multiplying and dividing the impartances of himself, but preserving the characteristic of his own hypostasis. For progressions becoming through diminution, first natures are every where in a certain manner multiplied into the decrements of secondary natures. But these proceeding according to a similitude to their producing causes receive their orderly distribution, so that the whole of that which proceeds is in a manner the same
55 The source of this is in the Phaedrus, p. 246: “Zeus, the mighty leader in heaven, driving a winged chariot, heads the divine procession, disposing and presiding over all things; and after him follows an army of Gods and daemons, distributed into eleven divisions.” Read the illuminating comment of Hermeias, and the notes of Ast, on this passage. Lamprias in Plutarch (Sympos. IX. 5.) says that Plato “calls the intelligible nature of the heaven a winged chariot, the harmonious revolution of the universe.” Plotinus, (En. V. 8. 10.), says: “Wherefore Zeus himself, who is the most ancient of the other Gods, whom he leads, proceeds first to the contemplation of the intelligible world; and the other Gods, daemons and souls, who are able to perceive these transcendently lucid objects, follow him.” Add Plotinus: En. III. 2. 1.; Proclus in Plat. Theol. IV. 16.; Damascius Περι Αρχων.
Proposition 126. Every God who is nearer to The One is more universal, but the God who is more remote from it is more particular. For the God who is the cause of more effects is nearer to that which produces all things; but he who is the cause of fewer is more remote from it. And he indeed who is the cause of many effects is more universal;
Proposition 127. Every divine nature, since it is simple, is specially primary, and on this account is most self-sufficient. For that it is simple is evident from its unity; since every divine nature is most unical. But a nature of this kind is transcendently simple. That it is likewise most sufficient to itself may be learned by considering that a composite nature is indigent, if not of other things to which it is external, yet of those things of which it is composed. But that which is most simple and unical, and which establishes itself in The Good, is most self-sufficient. Such, however, is every divine nature. Neither, therefore, is it indigent of other things, since it is goodness itself, nor of things requisite to composition, because it is unical.
Proposition 128. Every God, when participated by natures nearer to himself, is participated without a medium; but when participated by natures more remote from himself, the participation is through fewer or more media. For the former, since they are uniform and self-existent through their cognation, are able to participate immediately of the divine unities; but the latter, through
Proposition 129. Every divine body is divine through a divine soul: every soul is divine through a divine intellect: and every intellect is divine through the participation of a divine unity. Unity indeed is of itself a Cod: intellect is most divine: soul is divine, but body is deiform. For if every number of the Gods is above intellect, but participations are effected through cognate and similar natures, the impartible essence will primarily participate of the super-essential unities: secondarily the nature which comes into contact with generation will participate of them; and, thirdly, generation. Each of these likewise participates of them through the proximately superior natures: the peculiarity of the Gods indeed proceeding even to the last of things in its participants, but through media cognate to itself. For unity indeed imparts its transcendent power in divine concerns to the first intellect, and causes this intellect to be like itself according to unical multitude. But through intellect it is likewise present to soul, conjoining soul with intellect and co-inflaming it [with divine fire], when this intellect is participable. And through soul it imparts even to body an echo or resonance of its own peculiarity, if it is a body which participates in any respect of soul. And thus body becomes not only animated and intellectual, but likewise divine, receiving life and
56 As to the argument, see the Timaeus, p. 30; Plotinus: En. IV. 3. 21., En. IV. 4. 9 sq.; Proclus in Plat. Theol. p. 126 sq,; Porphyrii Sententt. cap. 1-7.
Proposition 130. In every divine order the things which are first are more exempt from the natures proximately arranged under them, than these latter are from things subsequent. And secondary natures are more dependent on their proximate superiors, than following natures are dependent on these. For the more unical and universal a nature is, the more is it allotted a greater transcendency with respect to subsequent natures. And the more diminished it is in power, the more is it connascent with the natures posterior to itself. And the higher natures indeed are more united with their more principal causes; but inferior natures are less united with them. For to be more exempt from subordinate natures, and to be more united to superior, implies a greater power: on the contrary, to recede in a greater degree from more excellent, and to be co-passive with subordinate natures, implies a diminution of power. And this happens to secondary, but not to primary natures, in every order of things.
Proposition 131. Every God begins his own activity from himself. For he first exhibits in himself the peculiarity of his presence to secondary natures, because he likewise imparts himself to other things according to his own exuberant plentitude. For neither does deficiency belong to the Gods, nor plentitude alone. For every thing
Proposition 132. All the orders of the Gods are bound in union by a medium. For all the progressions of beings are effected through similars; and much more will the orders of the Gods possess an indissoluble continuity, because they subsist uniformly, and are defined according to the one, which is the archical cause of their existence. The decrements, therefore, are produced unitedly, and alone according to the similitude in beings of secondary to primary natures. And this is so, because the hyparxis of the Gods much more consists in union than the subsistence of beings. All the divine genera, therefore, are bound together by appropriate media; and primary natures do not proceed into progressions perfectly different without a medium, but through the genera common to each, from which they proceed and of which they are immediately the causes. For these congregate the extremes into one union, being spread under some things connascently, but proximately exempt from others: and they preserve the well-ordered progeny of divine natures.
Proposition 133. Every God is a beneficent unity or an unific (ενοποιος) goodness; and each God so far as he is a deity has this hyparxis. The first God, however, is simply good, and simply one: but each posterior to the First is a certain goodness, and a certain unity. For the divine peculiarity distinguishes the unities and goodnesses of the Gods, so that each of the Gods benefits all things, according to a certain peculiarity of goodness, such as that of perfecting, containing, or defending: for each of these is a certain good, but not every good. But the First God pre-establishes a unical cause, and hence is The Good, which constitutes all all goodness. For all the hyparxes of the Gods are not together equal to The One; so great a transcendency is the First God allotted with respect to the multitude of the Gods.
Proposition 134. Every divine intellect knows as intellect, but acts providentially as a God. For it is the illustrious prerogative of intellect to know beings, and to have its perfection in intellections; but it is the province of a God to act providentially, and to fill all things with good. This impartance, however, and replenishing with good is accomplished through the union of the replenishing natures with the causes prior to themselves; which union intellect likewise imitating passes into sameness with intelligibles. A divine intellect, therefore, so far as it acts providentially is a God; because providence is an activity prior to intellect. Hence as a God it imparts itself to all things, but as an intellect it is not present to all things: for a divine nature extends to things into which the intellectual peculiarity does not proceed. For beings which are without
Proposition 135. Every divine unity is participated by some being immediately; and every deified nature is extended to one divine unity. As many likewise as are the unities which are participated, so many are the genera of beings which participate. For neither two or more unities are participated by one being. For how, when the peculiarities in the unities are changed would that which is connascent with each unity remain unchanged, since contact becomes through similitude? Nor is one unity participated in a divided manner by many beings: for many beings are unable to be conjoined with unity, and as beings they are unconjoined with the unity which is prior to beings, and as many they are separated from unity. It is necessary, however, that the nature which participates should be partly similar to that which is participated, and partly different and dissimilar. Since, therefore, that which participates is one of beings, but unity is super-essential, and according to this they are dissimilar, it is necessary that the participant should be one that thereby it may be similar to the one which is participated, though of these the latter is one in such a manner as to be unity, but the former so as to be passive to the one, and to be united through the participation of unity.
Proposition 136. Every God who is more universal and ranks nearer to the First, is participated by a more universal genus of beings. But the God who is more partial and more remote from the First, is participated by a more partial genus of beings. And as being is related to being, so is unity to divine unity.
57 The source of the argument is in the Parmenides. See Plotinus: En. VI. 6. 9 sqq.; Proclus in Plat, Theol. III. 1 sq.; III. 13.
Proposition 137. Every unity with the one constitutes the being which participates of it. For The One, since it constitutes all things, so likewise it is the cause of the unities which are participated, and of the beings which depend on these unities. But the unity of every being produces the peculiarity which shines forth in that particular being. And The One indeed is the cause of being simply; but unity is the
Proposition 138. Of all the deified natures which participate of the divine peculiarity, the first and highest is Being itself. For if being is beyond intellect and life, as has been demonstrated, and if it is likewise after The One the cause of the greatest number of effects, being will be the highest deified nature. For it is more unical than life and intellect, and is on this account entirely more venerable. But there is no other prior to it except The One. For prior to unical multitude what else can there be than The One? But being is unical multitude, because it consists of bound and infinity. And, universally, super-essential being is prior to essence:
58 For as Being itself is no other than the highest order of the Gods and the most uniform multitude, and as the characteristic of every God is a divine unity, hence the characteristic of Being itself will be the unity proceeding from bound. But as all the divine unities are super-essential, hence Being itself according to its characteristic will be super-essential.–Taylor.
59 For as matter is deservedly called non-being, because it is worse than all things; in like manner this appellation is proper to the First Cause, as he is better than all things.–Taylor.
60 See the Parmenides, p. 157; the Philebus, p. 14 sq.; Plotinus: En. VI. 5. 1 sqq.; Proclus in Plat. Theol. III. 7., IV. 27.; Porphyrii Sententt. cap. 27 et 38.
Proposition 139. All things which participate of the divine unities begin from being, but end in a corporeal nature. For being is the first of participants, but body the last: for we say that there are divine bodies. For the highest of all the genera of bodies, souls and intellects are attributed to the Gods, so that in every order things analogous to the Gods may connect and preserve secondary natures, and that each number may be a whole containing all things in itself, according to the whole which is in a part, and possessing prior to other things the divine peculiarity. The divine genus, therefore, subsists corporeally, psychically, and intellectually: and it is evident that all these are divine according to participation. For that which is primarily divine subsists in the unities. Hence the participants of the divine unities originate indeed from being, but end in a corpo real nature.
Proposition 140. All the powers of divine natures, having a supernal origin, and proceeding through appropriate media, extend even to the last of things and to the terrestrial regions.
61 See Plotinus: En. IV. 3. 1 sq., En. IV. 4. 22 sq. En. VI. 7. 11 sq.; Proclus in Plat. Theol. II. 1. II. 11.
For neither does any thing intercept these powers, 62 Thus too Hippocrates, ξυπποια μια, ςυμπνοια μια, παντα ςυμπαθεα, i.e. “there is one conflux, one conspiration, and all things sympathize with all.” existing in primary natures, but primary natures presenting themselves to the view in those which are secondary. For every thing subsists in a threefold manner, either through cause, through hyparxis, or by participation. He who understands this will see that the magic cultivated by the ancient philosophers is founded in a theory no less sublime than rational and true. Such a one will survey the universe as one great animal, all whose parts are in union and consent with each other, so that nothing is foreign and detached; nothing, strictly speaking, void of sympathy and life. For though various parts of the world, when considered as separated from the whole, are destitute of peculiar life yet they possess some degree of animation, however inconsiderable, when viewed with relation to the universe. Life indeed may be compared to a perpetual and universal sound; and the soul of the world resembles a lyre, or some other musical instrument, from which we may suppose this sound to be emitted, But from the unbounded diffusion as it were of the mundane soul every thing participates of this harmonical sound, in a greater or less perfection, according to the dignity of its nature. So that while life everywhere resounds, the most abject of beings may be said to retain a faint echo of melody produced by the mundane lyre. It was doubtless from profoundly considering this sympathy between the mundane soul and the parts of the world that the ancient philosophers were enabled to procure the presence of divinity, and performs effects beyond the comprehension of the vulgar. And that this was the opinion of Plotinus, the following passage evinces: “It appears to me that the ancient wise men, who wished to procure the presence of the Gods by fabricating statues and performing sacred rites, directed their intellectual eye to the nature of the universe, and perceived that the nature of the soul was everywhere easy to be attracted, when a proper subject was at hand, easily passive to its influence. But every thing adapted to imitation is readily passive, and is like a mirror able to seize a certain form, and reflect it to the view.” Ennead 4. lib. 3.–Taylor.
Proposition 141. Every providence of the Gods is twofold, one exempt from, the natures for which it provides, but the other coordinated with them. For some divine essences, through their hyparxis and the peculiarity of their order, are entirely expanded above the illuminated natures. But others, which are of the same order, provide for things subordinate of the same coordination; these likewise imitating the providential activity of the exempt Gods, and desiring to fill secondary natures with the good which they are able to impart.
63 See Plotinus: En. IV. 8. 2. and Proclus in Plat. Theol. I. 15.
Proposition 142. The Gods are present to all tilings in the same manner, but all things are not in the same manner present to the Gods. But every thing participates of their presence according to its own order and power. And this is accomplished by some things uniformly, but by others manifoldly; by some eternally, but by others according to time; and by some incorporeally, but by others corporeally. For it is necessary that the different participation of the same things should become different either from the participant, or from that which is participated. But every divine nature always has the same order, and is free from any relation to all things, and is unmixed. It follows therefore that the mutation must arise and subsist from the participants, and that in these there is that which is not invariably the same, and that at different times they are differently present to the Gods. Hence though the Gods are present to all things with invariable sameness, all things are not in the same manner present to them. But other things are present to them to the extent of their capacity, and according to the manner in which they are present they enjoy their illuminations. For the participation of the Gods is according to the measure of their presence.
Proposition 143. All inferior natures yield to the presence of the Gods, though the participant may be adapted to participation. Every thing alien recedes from the divine light, but all things are illuminated at once by the Gods. For divine natures are always more comprehensive and more powerful than the things which proceed from them. But the inaptitude of the participants is the cause of the deprivation of divine illumination: for this inaptitude obscures it by its own imbecility. And
Proposition 144. All beings, and all the distributions of beings, extend as far in their progressions as the orders of the Gods. For the Gods produce beings with themselves, nor is it possible for any thing to subsist, and to receive measure and order external to the Gods: for all things are perfected, disposed and measured by the power of the Gods. Prior therefore to the last genera in beings the Gods preexist, who likewise adorn these genera, and impart to them life, form and perfection, and convert them to The Good. In a similar manner, likewise, the Gods are prior to the middle and first genera of beings: and all things are bound and rooted in the Gods, and through this cause are preserved. But when any thing apostatizes from and becomes destitute of the Gods, it entirely departs into non-entity and vanishes, because it is wholly deprived of those natures by which it was contained.
Proposition 145. The peculiarity of every divine order pervades through all secondary natures, and imparts itself to all the subordinate genera of beings. For if beings proceed as far as the orders of the Gods extend, in every genus of beings there is a supernally-illuminated peculiarity of the divine powers. For every thing receives from its proximate appropriate cause the peculiarity according to which that cause is allotted its hypostasis. I say, for instance, if there is a certain purifying deity, there is likewise a purification in souls, in animals, in plants, and in stones. And, in a
64 As to the argument, see Plotinus: En. III. 8. 1 sqq.; Iamblichus De Myster. I. 8. and notes of Gale, p. 191; Porphyrii Sententt. 28-30; Proclus in Plat. Theol. IV. 8. IV. 16; and Damascius περι της αϕομοιωτικης διακοσυησεως, in his work Περι Αρχων, p. 199 sq., Vol. II. ed. Ruelle.
Proposition 146. The ends of all the divine progressions are assimilated to their principles, preserving a circle without a beginning and without an end, through the return of all to their principles.
65 Plotinus, (En. I. 7. 1.), says: “For it is necessary to posit The Good, on which all things depend, but it depends on nothing. Thus the absolute principle is The Good itself, which all things desire. It is requisite, therefore, that it abide immutably, converting all things to itself, just as the circle revolves about the centre, from which all the lines flow and to which they tend. An example to us is the Sun, which is as it were a centre to light, which emanates from it and at the same time is attached to it. Indeed light everywhere coexists with the Sun, and is nowhere separated from it: even if you should wish to sunder it into parts, nevertheless light will remain concentred in the Sun.” See, further, En. II. 2. 1., En. VI. 9. 8.
Proposition 147. The summits of all the divine orders are assimilated to the ends of the natures which are proximately above them. For if it is necessary that there should be a continuity of the divine progression, and that each order should be bound together by appropriate media, it is necessary that the summits of secondary should be conjoined with the ends of primary orders. But this contact becomes through similitude. Hence there will be a similitude of the principles of an inferior to the ends of a proximately superior order.
Proposition 148. Every divine order is united to itself in a threefold manner, viz. by the summit which is in it, by its middle, and by its end. For the summit having a power which is most unical transmits union to all the causal chain, and unites the whole of it, supernally abiding in itself. But the middle, extending to both extremes, binds together the whole order about itself; transmitting indeed the gifts of primary divine natures, but extending the powers of those which are last and inserting communion in all of
Proposition 149. Every multitude of the divine unities is bounded by number. For if it is most proximate to The One it will not be infinite: for the infinite is not connascent with The One, but alien to it. Indeed, if multitude of itself or essentially departs from The One, it is evident that infinite multitude is perfectly destitute of it. Hence it is powerless, and inefficacious. The multitude of the Gods therefore is not infinite. Hence it is uniform and finite, and is more finite than every other multitude: for it is nearer to The One than all other multitude. If therefore the principle of things was multitude, it would be necessary that every thing which is nearer to the principle should be a greater multitude than that which is more remote from it: for that which is nearer to any thing is more similar to it. Since, however, that which is first is The One, the multitude which is conjoined with it is a less multitude than that which is more remote from it. But the infinite is not a less, but the greatest possible multitude.
Proposition 150. Every nature which proceeds in the divine orders is not naturally adapted to receive all the powers of its producing cause. Nor in brief are secondary natures able to receive all the powers of the natures prior to themselves, but these have certain powers exempt from things in an inferior order, and incomprehensible by the beings posterior to themselves.
66 See the Phaedrus, p. 246 sq., and Commentary of Hermeias, p. 134 sq., ed Couvreur; Plotinus: En. V. 8. 3.; Proclus in Plat. Theol. II. 11. IV. 3.
For if the peculiarities or characteristics of the Gods differ from each other, those of the subordinate preexist in the superior divinities; but those of the superior, since they are more universal, are not in the subordinate. But more excellent natures impart indeed some powers to their progeny, but antecedently assume others in themselves, in an exempt manner. For it has been demonstrated that those Gods who are nearer to The One are more universal; and those more remote from it more partial. But if the more universal have powers comprehensive of the more partial, those that have a secondary and more partial order will not comprehend the power of the more universal Gods. In the superior therefore there is something incomprehensible and uncircumscribed by the inferior orders: for each of the divine orders is truly infinite. Nor is that which is infinite, as has been demonstrated, infinite to itself, nor much less to things above itself, but to all the natures posterior to itself: but infinity in these last is incapacity or power. The infinite, however, is incomprehensible by those natures to which it is infinite. Subordinate natures, therefore, do not participate of all the powers which more excellent natures antecedently comprehend in themselves: for the latter are incomprehensible by
Proposition 151. Every paternal order or genus in the Gods is primary, and pre-exists in the rank of The Good, according to all the divine orders. For the paternal genus produces the hyparxes of secondary natures, and total powers and essences, through one ineffable transcendency. Hence likewise it is denominated paternal, by reason of exhibiting the united and boniform power of The One, and the cause which constitutes secondary natures. And in each order of the Gods the paternal genus ranks as the leader, producing all things from itself, and adorning them, be cause it is arranged analogous to The Good. And of the divine fathers some are more universal, but others are more partial, just as the orders themselves of the Gods differ according to a more universal or particular nature, through a causal reason. As many therefore as are the universal progressions of the Gods, so many likewise are the differences of the fathers. For if there is that which is analogous to The Good in every order, it is necessary that there should be a paternal genus in all the orders, and that each order should proceed from the paternal union.
67 On the paternal order of the Gods, and the paternal Gods, consult Iamblichus On the Mysteries, VIII. 2. 3. and the Notes of Gale, p. 297; and Proclus in Plat. Theol. V. 3. VI. 6.
Proposition 152. Every thing which is generative in the Gods proceeds according to the infinity of divine power, multiplying itself, proceeding through all things, and transcendently exhibiting a never-failing power in the progressions of secondary natures. For to multiply things which proceed, and to produce things into progeny from the occult comprehension in causes, of what else is it the prerogative than of the infinite power of the Gods, through which all divine natures are filled with prolific good? For every thing which is full produces other things from itself through a super-plenary power. The domination of power therefore is the peculiarity of generative deity, which multiplies the powers of the things generated, renders them prolific, and excites them to generate and constitute other things. For if every nature imparts the appropriate peculiarity which it has primarily to other things, every nature which is prolific will impart to natures posterior to itself a prolific progression, and will adumbrate the infinity which is the primary leader of wholes, from which every generative power proceeds, and which in an exempt manner pours forth the perennial progressions of divine natures.
Proposition 153. Every thing perfect in the Gods is the cause of divine perfection. For as the hypostases of beings are of one kind, but those of super-essential natures of another, so likewise of perfections—those of the Gods themselves are in their hyparxis, but those of beings are secondary and posterior to them. And the former are self-perfect and primary, because The Good subsists primarily in them; but the latter possess perfection through participation.
Proposition 154. Every thing which is of a guardian nature in the Gods preserves every thing in its proper order, and is uniformly exempt from secondary and established in primary natures. For if a guard immutably preserves the measure of the order of every thing, and connectedly contains all the natures which are guarded in their appropriate perfection, it will impart to all things an excellence superior to subordinate beings, and will firmly establish each thing unmingled in itself, existing as the cause of undefiled purity to the natures which are guarded, and fixing them in superior beings. For every thing is perfect which adheres to primary natures, is in itself alone, and is expanded above all things subordinate.
Proposition 155. Every thing vivific in the Gods is a generative cause, but every generative cause is not vivific. For a generative is more universal than a vivific cause, and is nearer to the principle of all things. For generation manifests a cause which produces beings into multitude: but vivification represents to us the deity who is the supplier of all life. If therefore the former multiplies the hypostases of beings, but the latter the progressions of life,—if this be the case, as being is to life so is the generative order to the vivific causal chain. Hence the former will be more universal and the cause
Proposition 156. Every cause of purity is contained in the guardian order: but on the contrary every genus of a guardian order is not the same with the purifying genus. For purity imparts to all the Gods the unmingled with things inferior, and the undefiled in the providence of secondary natures. But a guardian power likewise effects this, contains all things in itself, and firmly inserts them in superior natures. The guardian therefore is more universal than the purifying genus. For, in brief, the peculiarity of the guardian power is to pre serve the order of every thing the same with reference to itself, and to the natures prior and posterior to itself: but the peculiarity of purity is to keep more excellent natures exempt from those which are subordinate. These powers however are primarily in the Gods. For it is necessary that there should be one cause preceding that which is in all things, and, in brief, that there should be uniform measures of all good causally comprehended by the Gods. For there is no good in secondary natures which does not pre-exist in the Gods: for what other origin or cause can this have? Hence in the divinities purity is likewise a primary good, guardianship, and every thing of this kind.
Proposition 157. Every paternal cause is the supplier of being to all things, and constitutes the hyparxes of beings. But every nature which is fabricative of the production of form exists prior to composite natures, and precedes their order and division according to number, and is likewise of the same co ordination with the paternal cause in the more partial genera of things. For each of these is of the order of bound; since
68 See Proclus in Platonis Tim. p. 269 sq. Vol. III. ed. Diehl.
Proposition 158. Every elevating cause in the Gods differs both from a purify ing cause and from the revertive genera. For it is evident that this cause has necessarily a primary subsistence in the Gods; since in these all the causes of total good pre-exist. But it subsists prior to the purifying cause: for the one liberates from things of a subordinate nature, but the other conjoins with more excellent natures. The elevating however has a more partial order than the revertive cause, because every nature which returns, returns either to itself, or to that which is more excellent than itself. But the work of the elevating cause is characterized by a return to that which is more excellent, because it leads that which re turns to a superior and more divine cause.
9 See Iamblichus De Mysteriis, VIII. 8.; Porphyrii Sententt. cap. 34.; Proclus in Plat. Tim. p. 165 Vol. III. ed. Diehl: Proclus in Plat. Theol. IV. 9, IV 19. V. 18.
Proposition 159. Every order of the Gods consists of the first principles, Bound and Infinity. But one order is caused more by Bound, and another by Infinity. For every order proceeds from each of these principles, because the impartances of first causes extend through all secondary natures. But in some things bound predominates in the mixture [of bound and infinity,] and in others infinity. And thus the genus which has the form of bound is perfected in which the powers of bound dominate: and so too the genus which has the form of the infinite is perfected in which the powers of infinity dominate.
70 Consult Plotinus: En. III. 8. 8. sq., En. VI. 6. 18.; Proclus in Plat. Theol. II. 4.; Damascius Περι Αρχων.
Proposition 160. Every divine intellect is uniform and perfect. And the first intellect is from itself, and produces other intellects. For if it is a God it is filled with divine unities, and is uniform. But if this be so, it is likewise perfect, because it is full of divine goodness. And if this be admitted, it is likewise primarily intellect, since it is united to the Gods: for deified intellect is better than every intellect. But since it is primarily intellect, it likewise imparts an hypostasis to other intellects. For all secondary natures receive their hyparxis from the primary natures.
71 For further information about Intellect, see Plotinus: En. I. 3. 5., En. V. 1. 8., En. V. 9., En. VI. 2. 4., En. VI. 7. 35.; Proclus in Plat. Theol. p. 53; Aristot. De Anima I. 5.
Proposition 161. Every thing which is truly being, and because it depends on the Gods, is divine and imparticipable. For since that which is truly being is the first of the natures which participate of the divine union, as has been demonstrated, it likewise fills intellect from itself. For intellect is being, because it is filled with being, and true being is therefore a divine intelligible: as that which is deified it is divine, but as that which fills intellect, and is participated by it, it is intelligible. Intellect likewise is being through that which is primarily being. But that which is primarily being itself is separate from intellect, because intellect is posterior to being. But imparticipables subsist prior to things which are participated: hence being which subsists by itself and is imparticipable is prior to the being which is conjoined with intellect. For it is intelligible, not as co-arranged with intellect, but as perfecting intellect in an exempt manner, because it imparts being to it, and fills it with truly existing essence.
Proposition 162. Every multitude of unities which illuminates truly existing being is arcane and intelligible; arcane since it is conjoined with The One, but intelligible because it is participated by being. For all the Gods are denominated from the things which depend on them; because from these it is possible to know their different hypostases, which are [of themselves] unknown. For every thing divine is of itself ineffable and unknown, because it is connascent with the Ineffable One.
72 Compare Iamblichus, On the Mysteries, VIII. 2.: “Prior to truly existing beings and universal principles there is one God prior even to [that deity who is generally believed to be] the first God and king, abiding immovable in the solitude of his own unity. For neither is the intelligible, nor any other nature, connected with him.…he is worshipped by silence alone.” And Damascius Περι Αρχων (p. 324 Vol. I.): “The Egyptians in certain discourses celebrate the One Principle of all as an Unknown Darkness, and this thrice pronounced as such.”
From the difference, however,
Proposition 163. Every multitude of unities which is participated by imparticipable intellect is intellectual. For as intellect is to truly existing being, so are these unities to the intelligible unities. If, therefore, the latter which illuminate being are intelligible, hence the former which illuminate a divine and imparticipable intellect are intellectual. Yet they are not intellectual in such a way as if they subsisted in intellect, but as causally existing prior to intellect, and generating intellect.
Proposition 164. Every multitude of unities which is participated by every imparticipable soul is supermundane. For because imparticipable soul is primarily above the world, the Gods also which are participated by it are likewise supermundane, having the same analogy or proportion to the intellectual and intelligible Gods which soul has to intellect, and intellect to truly existing being. As, therefore, every soul depends on intellect, and intellect returns to the intelligible, thus likewise the supermundane are dependent on the intellectual,
73 On the Gods, supermundane, intellectual, intelligible, etc., see Proclus in Plat. Theol. pp. 8. 38. 59. 97. 107. 191-194, 270. 328., and Damascius Περι Αρχων.
Proposition 165. Every multitude of unities which is participated by a certain sensible body is mundane. For it illuminates the parts of the world through the medium or intervening" of intellect and soul.
74 Compare Aristotle De Anima III. 4.: Plotinus: En. IV. 3. 3 sq.; Proclus in Plat. Theol. pp, 17, 36. 42. 128, 141. 259. 469.
Proposition 166. Every intellect is either imparticipable or participable And if participable, it is either participated by supermundane or by mundane souls. For imparticipable intellect, having a primary
Proposition 167. Every intellect thinks itself: but the Primal Intellect thinks itself only, and in this intellect Thought and the object of thought (the intelligible) are one numerically. But each of the subsequent intellects thinks itself and the natures prior to itself. And the intelligible to each of these is partly that which it is (itself) and partly that from which it emanates. For every intellect either thinks itself, or that which is above itself, or that which is posterior to itself. But if it thinks that which is posterior to itself, since it is intellect, it will turn to that which is less excellent than itself; and thus will not know that to which it turns, because the object of its thought is not in itself, but external to itself: and it will only know the image of this thing, which was generated in itself from it. For that which it has it knows, and that which it experiences, but not that which it does not possess, and by which it is not affected.
But if it thinks that which is above itself, if indeed this is done through the knowledge of itself, it will at
75 Thus, for instance, Intellect in being itself, which comprehends the highest order of intelligibles, is νους νοητος or an intelligible intellect, because it is the object of intelligence to all subordinate natures, and because its vision is transcendently simple and occult. But every intellect is indeed the same with the intelligible in its own nature, but is subordinate to the Intelligible itself.–Taylor.
Proposition 168. Every intellect in activity knows that it thinks, and it is not the peculiarity of one intellect to think, and of another to know that it thinks.
For if it is intellect in activity, and thinks itself to be no other than the object of thought, it will know itself, and see itself.
76 Intellect in energy, or in the act of understanding, is the same with the object of its intellection. For the object of its perception must be resident in its essence, or it would perceive externally like sense; and thus would not behold the thing itself, but only its image. But if that which is intelligible is seated in the essence of intellect, it will in no respect differ from intellect: for it will be essential to its nature, and will consequently be intellectual as well as intelligible.–Taylor.
But the intellect itself is likewise intelligible, in the same manner as other intelligible natures are; and in those beings which are wholly separated from matter that which thinks and that which is thought are the same.–Aristotle: De Anima III. 4.
Proposition 169. Every intellect has its essence, power and action in eternity. For if intellect thinks itself, and intellect and the intelligible are the same, thought likewise is the same as intellect and the intelligible. For, since thinking is the medium between that which thinks and the object of thought, and these are the same, thinking likewise will be the same with each. But that the essence of intellect is eternal is evident—for the whole of it subsists at once—and thinking is likewise eternal, since it is the same with the essence of intellect. For if intellect is immovable, it will not be measured by time, neither according to its being nor its activity: but since these subsist with invariable sameness, the power likewise of intellect will be eternal.
Proposition 170. Every intellect thinks all things together. But imparticipable intellect thinks all things together simply: and each of the intellects subsequent to it thinks oil things according to one or under the form of the singular. For if every intellect establishes its essence in eternity, and together with its essence its activity, it will think all things together: but to every nature which is not established in eternity the successive objects of its perception subsist according to parts or severally. For every thing which is successive is in time; the successive consisting of prior and posterior, but the whole of it not existing together. If therefore all intellects similarly think (know) all things, they will not diher from each other. For if they think all things similarly they are similarly all things, since they are the very things which they think. But if all intellects are similarly all things, one intellect will not be imparticipable and another not. For their essences are the same tilings as the objects of their thought; since the thinking of each intellect is the same with the being of each, and each is both thought and essence. It follows, therefore, either that each intellect does not similarly think all things, but one thing, or more than one, but not all things together; or that it thinks (knows) all things according to one (under the form of the singular).
77 By an intellectual perception of all things according to the one, Proclus means a perception of all things in one. For all intellectual forms are in each; so that a perception of one is a perception of all forms, and therefore of all things.–Taylor.
For if it is transitive in its activity, and thinks (knows) all things not together but according to prior and posterior, (i.e. knows one thing first and another subsequently),
Proposition 171. Every intellect is an imparticipable essence. For if it is without magnitude, incorporeal and immovable, it is impartible. For every thing which in any way whatsoever is partible, is either partible by reason of magnitude, or multitude, or of activities which function in time. But intellect is eternal in all things, and is beyond bodies, and the multitude which is in it is united. It is, therefore, impartible. That intellect likewise is incorporeal, the return to itself evidences: for no body returns to itself. But that it is eternal, the identity of its activity with its essence shows. For this has been before demonstrated. And that the multitude in it is united is evident from the continuity of intellectual multitude with the divine unities: for these are the first multitude, but intellects are next to these. Hence though every intellect is a multitude, yet it is an united multitude. For prior to that which is divided that which is collected into profound union, and is nearer to The One, subsists.
Proposition 172. Every intellect is proximately the producing cause of natures perpetual and immutable in essence. For every nature which is produced by an immovable cause, is immutable in essence. But immovable intellect being all things eternally, and abiding in eternity, produces by its very being that which it produces. If therefore intellect always is, and is invariably the same, it always produces, and in the same manner. Hence it is not the cause of things which at one time exist and at another time not, but it is the cause of things which always exist.
Proposition 173. Every intellect is intellectual, and the things which are prior and posterior to itself are likewise intellectual. For the things which are posterior to itself are intellectual through cause, but the things which are prior to itself through participation: but intellect is the same, and is allotted an intellectual essence. Hence it defines all things according to its essence; both the things which are through cause, and those which are through participation. For every thing participates of more excellent beings in the way that it is naturally adapted to participate, and not according to the subsistence of the more excellent: for otherwise they would be similarly participated by all things. Participations therefore are according to the peculiarity and power of the participants. Hence in intellect the natures prior to it subsist intellectually; but intellect is likewise intellectually the things posterior to itself. For it does not consist of its effects, nor does it contain these but the causes of these in itself. But intellect is by its very being the cause of all things: and the very being of it is intellectual. Hence it contains intellectually the causes of all things, and
Proposition 174. Every intellect constitutes the things posterior to itself by thinking, and its creation is in thinking, and its thought in creating. For if intelligible and intellect are the same, the essence likewise of every intellect will be the same with the thinking in itself. But intellect does that which it does through its essence, and produces according to the very being which it is, and by thought therefore it will produce the things which are produced. For in intellect being and thought are one. For intellect is the same with every being which it contains. If therefore it makes by its very being, but its very being is thought, it makes by thinking. The activity of thought consists in thinking, and this is the same with the essence of intellect, and the function of the essence of intellect is to produce. For that which produces immovably, always has its very being in producing: the thought of intellect therefore consists in producing.
Proposition 175. Every intellect is primarily participated by those natures which are intellectual both in essence and activity. For it is necessary that every intellect should either be participated by those, or by other natures which have indeed an intellectual essence but do not always think, it is however impossible that it should be participated by the latter. For the activity of intellect is immovable. And hence the natures by which it is
Corollary. From this therefore it is evident that it is impossible for the soul which at one time thinks and at another does not to participate proximately of intellect.
Proposition 176. All intellectual forms are in each other, and each, is at the same time per se and distinct from the others. For if every intellect is impartible, and the multitude which is in it is united through intellectual impartibility, all things in it will be in one, impartibles will be united to each other, and all intellectual forms will pervade through all. But if all intellectual forms are immaterial and incorporeal they are unconfused with each other and separate, and each preserving its own purity remains that which it is. The peculiar participation however of each participating in a separate manner manifests the unconfused nature of intellectual forms. For unless the forms which are participated were different and apart from each other, the participants
Corollary. But if any one, in addition to these demonstrations, needs examples, he may consider the theorems which exist in one soul. For all these are in the same soul, an essence which is truly without magnitude, and are united to each other. For that which is without magnitude does not locally contain the things which are in it, but impartibly and without interval, and the natures which it contains are united and separated. For the soul of itself draws forth all the propositions, each apart from each, drawing nothing to itself from the rest which, unless they were always separated in habit, would not be separated by the action of the soul.
Proposition 177. Every intellect being a plenitude of forms, one intellect contains more universal but another more partial forms. And the superior intellects contain more universally the things which those posterior to them contain more partially. But tire inferior intellects contain more partially the things which, those that are prior to them contain more universally. For the superior intellects use greater powers, because they are more unical than secondary intellects. But the inferior intellects, since they are more multiplied, diminish the powers which they contain. For things which are more cognate to The One, because they are contracted in quantity are superior in power to the natures which are posterior to them. And, on the contrary, things more remote from The One because they are increased in quantity are inferior to the natures which are nearer to The One. Hence the superior intellects, since they are essentially greater in power but less in multitude, through forms which are quantitatively less produce more effects; but the intellects posterior to them produce fewer effects through forms which are quantitatively more by reason of a deficiency in power. If therefore the former produce more effects through fewer forms, the forms in them are more universal: and if the latter produce fewer effects through a greater number of forms, the forms in them are more partial.
Corollary. Hence it happens that the natures which are generated from superior intellects through one form are produced divisibly from secondary intellects through many forms. And, again, those natures which are produced by inferior intellects through many and distinct forms, are produced by superior intellects through
Proposition 178. Every intellectual form constitutes eternal natures. For if every intellectual form is eternal and immovable, it is essentially the cause of immutable and eternal hypostases, but not of those which become and are corruptible: so that every thing which subsists by reason of an intellectual form is an eternal intellectual nature. For if all forms produce things posterior to themselves by their very being, but their being has an invariable sameness of subsistence, the things produced by them will likewise be invariably the same, and will be eternal. Neither therefore do the genera which are only in time subsist from a formal cause, nor have corruptible natures as such a pre-existent intellectual form. For they would be incorruptible and unbegotten, if they derived their hypostasis from intellectual forms.
Proposition 179. Every intellectual number is finite. For if there is another multitude posterior to this, essentially inferior to it, and thus more remote from The One, but the intellectual number is nearer to The One, and if that which is nearer to The One, is quantitatively less, but that which is more remote from it is quantitatively more.—If this be the case, the intellectual number likewise will be less than every multitude posterior to it. Hence it is not infinite. The multitude
78 See Plotinus: En. VI. 6. 8 sq.; Proclus in Plat. Theol. IV. 29; Hermiae Scholia in Plat. Phaedrum, p. 167 sq., ed. Couvreur.
Proposition 180. Every intellect is a whole, because each consists of parts, and is at once united to other intellects and differentiated from them. But imparticipable Intellect is a whole simply, since it has in itself all the parts totally or under the form of the whole: but each partial intellect contains the whole as in a part, and thus is nil things partially. For if a partial intellect is all things according to one, and a subsistence according to one is nothing else than a subsistence partially, the whole is in each of these intellects partially, being defined according to a certain one particular thing which dominates in all of them.
Proposition 181. Every participated intellect is either divine because it depends on the Gods, or is intellectual only. For if there is a divine and imparticipable intellect primarily, the intellect which is cognate to this is not that which differs from it in both respects, viz. which is neither divine nor imparticipable. For things which are dissimilar in both these respects cannot be conjoined to each other. It is evident therefore that the medium between these is partly similar to that which is primarily intellect, and partly dissimilar to it. Either, therefore, it is imparticipable and not divine; or it is participated and divine. But every nature imparticipable is divine, because it is allotted an order in multitude analogous to The One. Hence there will be a certain
Proposition 182. Every divine participated intellect is participated by divine souls. For if participation assimilates the participant to that which is participated, and renders the former connascent with the latter, it is evident that the participant of a divine intellect must be a divine soul, and dependent on a divine intellect, and that through intellect as a medium it must participate of the deity which it contains. For deity conjoins the soul which participates of it with intellect, and binds the divine to the divine.
Proposition 183. Every intellect which is participated indeed but is intellectual alone is participated neither by divine souls nor by those which experience a mutation from intellect into a privation of intellect. For neither are divine souls of this kind, nor those which participate of intellect. For souls participate of the Gods through intellect, as has been demonstrated.
Proposition 184. Every soul is either divine, or is that which changes from intellect into a privation of intellect, or that which always remains as a medium between these, but is inferior to divine souls. For if divine intellect indeed is participated by divine souls, but that intellect which is intellectual alone by those souls which are neither divine, nor receive a mutation from intelligence into a privation of intellect,—for there are souls of this kind which at one time think and at another do not,—if this be the case, it is evident that there are three genera of souls. And the first of these are divine; but the second are not divine, yet al ways participate of intellect; and the third are those which at one time change into intellect, and at an other into a privation of intellect.
Proposition 185. All divine souls are Gods psychically. But all those which participate of an intellectual intellect are the perpetual attendants of the Gods. And all those which are the recipients of mutation are only occasionally the attendants of the Gods. For if upon some souls the divine light supernally shines, but others always think, and others again only occasionally participate of this perfection,—if this be the case, the first of these among the multitude of souls will be analogous to the Gods: and the second will
79 Consult Plat. De Legg. X. p. 897; Protrepticus of Iamblichus, cap. 8; Cicero De Officiis III. 10. The last words of Plotinus, “great and uncommon, admirable and sublime,” were: “and now the god within me is striving to return to the God of the universe.” The following emphatic reminder by Epictetus, (Discourses II. 8.), that the soul is a divinity is apposite: “But you are a superior nature; you are a portion separated from the Deity; you have in yourself a certain portion of him. Why then are you ignorant of your own noble descent? Why do you not know whence you came? Will you not remember when you are eating, who you are who eat and whom you feed?…When you are in social intercourse, when you are exercising yourself, when you are engaged in discussion, know you not that you are nourishing a god, that you are exercising a god? Wretch! you are carrying about a god with you, and you know it not. Do you think that I mean some God of silver or of gold, and external? You carry him within yourself, and you perceive not that you are polluting him by impure thoughts and dirty deeds. And if an image of God were present, you would not dare to do any of the things which you are doing: but when God himself is present within and sees all and hears all, you are not ashamed of thinking such things and doing such things, ignorant as you are of your own nature and subject to the anger of God.”
Proposition 186. Every soul is an incorporeal essence and separable from the body. For if it knows itself, but every thing which knows
* Additional Notes, p. 173: Plotinus, (En. IV. 7. 8.), says: “But that thought is not possible, if the soul is a body in any respect or of any kind, may be demonstrated as follows. For if sensation is the soul’s perceiving sensible objects by the aid or use of the body, thought cannot be apprehension through the aid of the body, since in that case thought and sensation would be the same. Hence if thought is apprehension without the body, much more is it necessary that the thinking nature should not be body. Further, if sensation is the perception of sensible objects, thought is the perception of intelligible objects. If they are not willing to admit this, they must at least concede that we have thoughts of certain intelligible objects, and apprehensions of things without magnitude (extension). How, therefore, will the soul, if it is a magnitude, think that which is not magnitude, and by its divisible nature think the indivisible? Will it think it by a certain indivisible part of itself? But if this be so, that which thinks will not be a body. For in this case there will be no need of the whole for the contact of thought with its object, since contact by one part will be sufficient. If therefore they admit, which is true, that the primary thoughts are of those things which are entirely free from the body, that is, of absolutes, it is necessary that the nature which thinks, only as being or becoming free from the body, can know them. But if they say that thoughts are of forms inherent in matter, yet these are only apprehended by abstracting them from bodies, and this is the work of intellect. For the abstraction, for instance, of a circle, a triangle, a line, and a point, is not effected in conjunction with flesh, or matter at all. Hence it is requisite that the soul, in a work of this kind, should abstract herself from the body. And it follows therefore that she herself cannot be body. I think, likewise, that beauty and justice are without magnitude, and hence the thought of these is similarly without magnitude. Wherefore, when these approach the soul, she will apprehend them by the indivisible part of herself, and, indivisible themselves, they will abide in her indivisible self. How, moreover, if the soul is body, can temperance, justice, fortitude, and other virtues, which preserve it so far as they are received by it, belong to it?”
Plotinus’ refutation of the materialists in this book, On the Immortality of the Soul, is final. He strikes out the foundation of every materialistic argument. The whole book will richly repay a thorough study. Taylor’s translation of it appears in his Select Works of Plotinus, (London, 1817), which was reprinted in Bonn’s Philosophical Library, in 1895. Copious extracts from it, admirably translated by Prof. B. A. G. Fuller, one of the rare students of Plotinus in this country, are published in Dr. Bakewell’s excellent Source Book in Ancient Philosophy, (New York, 1907).
But that the soul knows itself is evident. For if it knows the natures which are above itself, and is naturally able to know itself, much more will it know itself through the causes prior to itself.
80 For inferiors are comprehended in superiors, and particulars in universals; so that he who knows universals knows particulars also, though the reverse of this is not true. The soul therefore by possessing a natural capacity of knowing herself, and things superior to her own nature, will from the illuminations attending her knowledge of the latter know herself in a much more eminent and perspicuous manner.–Taylor.
See Hermeias’ Commentary on the Phaedrus, p. 114 sq. ed. Couvreur. A translation of his Platonic Demonstration of the Immortality of the Soul may be read in my Opuscula Platonica. This Commentary is a very valuable work, and is full of profound thought.
Proposition 187. Every soul is indestructible and incorruptible. For every thing which can in any way whatsoever be dissolved and destroyed is either corporeal and composite, or is allotted its hypostasis in a subject. And that indeed which is dissolved is corrupted because it consists of a multitude of divisible parts: and that of which it is the nature to exist in another vanishes into non-entity when separated from its subject. But the soul is incorporeal and external to every subject, subsisting in itself, and returning to itself. Hence it is indestructible and incorruptible.
81 See the Phaedo, p. 106; Hermeias in Phaedrum, p. 101 sq.; Proclus in Plat. Theol. I. p. 66 sq.; Nemesius De Natura Hominis, cap. II. et III.
Proposition 188. Every soul is both life and vital. For that to which soul accedes necessarily lives, and that which is deprived of soul at once becomes destitute of life. Either therefore it lives through soul, or through something else, and not through soul. It is however impossible that it should live through something else alone. For every thing which is participated either imparts itself, or something of itself, to its participant. But if it experiences neither of these, it will not be participated. Soul however is participated by that to which it is present, and that which participates of soul is said to be animated. If therefore that which is participated introduces life to animated natures it is either life, or vital alone, or both life and vital. If however soul is alone vital, but not likewise life, it will consist of life and non-life, and will not therefore know itself, nor return to itself. For knowledge is life, and the gnostic power so far as it is such is vital?
82 This truly divine sentence is derived from the most profound theory, and can alone be understood by those who have deeply studied the six books of Proclus on Plato’s Theology.–Taylor.
83 Consult the Phaedo, cap. 26, and the Disputatio of Wyttenbach on Immortality, prefixed to his edition of the Phaedo; the Phaedrus, p. 246; Plotinus: En. I. 1. 4 sq.; Porphyrii Sententt. cap. XVI. XVIII.; Hermeias In Plat. Phaedr. p. 118 sq.; Astii Com. in Phaedr. p. 118, 293; Nemesius De Natura Hominis, p. 95 sqq.
Proposition 189. Every soul is self-vital. For if it is able to return to itself, but every thing which returns to itself is self-subsistent, the soul therefore is self-subsistent, and constitutes itself. But it is likewise life and vital, and its hyparxis is in vitality, For the soul imparts life by its very being to the natures to which it is present. And if the participant is fit for participation it immediately becomes animated and vital; soul in effecting this not reasoning nor acting from deliberate choice, nor vivifying by cogitation and judgment, but by its very essence and by that which it is imparting life to the participant. Hence the being of soul is the same as to live. If therefore the soul possesses being from itself and this is the same as to live, and it has life essentially, it will impart life to itself, and will possess it from itself. But if this be admitted, soul will be self-vital.
Proposition 190. Every soul is a medium, between impartible natures and the natures which are divisible about bodies. For if soul is self-vital and self-subsistent, and has an hyparxis separable from bodies, it is exempt from and more excellent than all the natures which are divisible about body: for the corporeal natures are entirely inseparable from their subjects, because they are co-distributed with divisible bulks, depart from themselves, and their own impartibility, and are co-extended with bodies. And though they subsist in lives, these are not the lives of themselves but of participants: and though they exist in essence and in forms, yet they are not the forms of themselves but of those things which are constituted by forms. If therefore soul is none of these, it is a self-subsistent essence, a self-vital life, and
Proposition 191. Every participable soul has an eternal essence, but its action is temporal. For either it possesses each eternally, or each temporally; or the one eternally, but the other temporally. It cannot however possess each eternally: for it would be an impartible essence, and the nature of soul would in no respect differ from an intellectual hypostasis, viz. a self-motive from an immovable nature. Nor can it possess each temporally: for thus it would be generated only, and would neither be self-vital, nor self-subsistent. For nothing which is essentially measured by time is
Proposition 192. Every participable soul ranks among the number of truly existing beings, and is the first of generated natures. For if it is essentially eternal it is truly being through its hyparxis, and always is. For that which participates of eternity participates likewise of perpetual existence. But if it is in time according to action, it is generated. For every thing which participates of time, since it is always becoming to be, according to the prior and posterior of time, and is not at once that which it is, is wholly generated. But if every soul is in a certain respect generated through its action, it will be the first of generated natures. For that which is in every respect generated is more remote from eternal natures.
Proposition 193. Every soul subsists proximately from intellect. For if it has an immutable and eternal essence, it proceeds from an immovable essence. For that which proceeds from a movable cause, is essentially changed in every respect. The cause therefore of every soul is immovable. But if it proximately subsists from intellect, it is perfected by and returns to intellect. And if it participates of the knowledge which
Proposition 194. Every soul contains all the forms which intellect primarily possesses. For if soul proceeds from intellect, and intellect constitutes it; and if intellect subsisting immovably produces all things by its very being, it will likewise impart to soul which it constitutes the essential reasons or productive principles of all things which it contains. For every thing which produces by its very being imparts secondarily to the thing generated by it that which it is itself primarily. The soul therefore contains secondarily the representations of intellectual forms.
84 See Plato De Repub. VI. p. 500, X. p. 613; Legg. IV. p. 716; Theaetetus, p. 176.
Proposition 195. Every soul is all things, containing sensibles paradigmalically, but intelligibles iconically.
85 Aristotle, (De Anima III. 8.), says; “Now, however, summarily recapitulating what has been said about the soul, we repeat that the soul is in a certain respect all beings: for all beings are either objects of Sense or objects of Thought; and knowledge and sense are in a certain way the same with their respective objects.” Compare Porphyrii Sententt. cap. XVII.
Those
Proposition 196. Every participable soul primarily uses a perpetual body, of which has an unbegotten and incorruptible hypostasis.
86 Consult Plotinus: En. II. 9.16 sq.; Proclus in Plat. Theol. II. 11.
For if every soul is essentially eternal, and by its very being primarily animates some particular body, it will always animate this body: for the essence of soul is immutable. But if this be the case, that which is animated by it is always animated, and always participates of the life of soul: and that which always lives by a much greater priority always exists. But that which always is, is perpetual. Hence that which is primarily attached to every soul is perpetual. But every participable soul is primarily participated by a certain body, since it is participable and not imparticipable, and animates its participant by its very being. Every participated soul therefore uses a body which is primarily perpetual, and
Proposition 197. Every soul is an essence vital and gnostic, and a life essential and gnostic, and is knowledge, essence, and life. All these, the essential, the vital, and the gnostic, subsist in it together; and all are in all, and each is apart from the others.
87 Compare Porphyrii Sententt. cap. XVIII. et cap. XXXIX.
Proposition 198. Every nature which participates of time, and is always moved, is measured by circuits. For since it is measured by time, the motion of it likewise participates of the measure and bound of time, and proceeds according to number: but because it is always moved, and this always is not eternal but temporal, it is necessary that it should use circuits. For motion is a mutation from some things to others. But beings are bounded by multitudes and magnitudes. These however being finite, there can neither be a mutation to infinity according to a right line, nor can that which is always moved make its transitions finitely. Hence that which is always moved will proceed from the same to the same, and thus will proceed periodically.
Proposition 199. Every mundane soul uses circuits of its proper life, and restitutions to its pristine state. For if it is measured by time, it acts transitively and has a peculiar motion. But every nature which is moved and participates of time, if it is perpetual uses circuits, periodically revolves, and proceeding from the same to the same is restored to its former state. And every mundane soul having motion, and energizing in time, will have circuits of motions, and restitutions to its pristine state. For every period of perpetual natures is apocatastatic or restorative to a former condition.
88 See Plotinus: En. VI. 9. 8.; Proclus in Plat. Theol. IV. 16. V. 10.; Olympiodorus in Plat. Alcibiades Prior, p. 37, ed. Creuzer.
Proposition 200. Every circuit of soul is measured by time. The circuit of other souls is measured by a certain time, but the circuit of the first soul measured by time is measured by the whole of time.
89 On the first soul see Aristotle: De Anima II. 4.: Plotinus: En. II. 9, 4.; Proclus in Plat. Theol. I. 12.
That the soul, therefore, which is primarily measured by time is measured by the whole of time, is evident. For if time is the measure of all motion, that which is primarily moved will participate of all time, and will be measured by the whole of time. For if the whole of time did not measure its first participant, it would not measure any thing else, according to the whole of itself. That all other souls however are measured by certain measures which are more partial than the whole of time, is evident from what has been demonstrated. For if these souls are more partial than the soul which primarily participates of time, neither can they adapt their circuits to the whole of time. But the multitude of their restitutions will be parts of the one circuit and restitution through which the soul that primarily participates of time returns to its pristine state. For a more partial participation belongs to an inferior power, but a more total to a greater power. Other souls, therefore, are not naturally adapted to
Proposition 201. All divine souls have triple energies: one as souls, another as receiving a divine intellect, and another as attached to the Gods. And they provide for the whole of things as Gods, but know all things through an intellectual life, and move bodies through a self-motive essence. For because they psychically participate of the natures which are superior to them, and are not simply souls but divine souls, and have an order in the psychical extent analogous to the Gods, they energize not only psychically but likewise divinely, being allotted a divine summit of their essence, and because they likewise have an intellectual hypostasis, through which they are placed under intellectual essences. Hence they not only energize divinely, but likewise intellectually: constituting one action according to the one which they contain, but the other according to intellect. A third action (activity) is present to them according to their own hyparxis, which is motive indeed of things naturally alter-motive, but is vivific of those which possess an adventitious life. For this is the characteristic work of every soul; but the activities which are intellectual and providential they have through participation.
Proposition 202. All souls attending upon and always following the Gods are inferior to divine, but are developed, above partial souls. For divine souls participate of intellect and deity, and hence are at the same time intellectual and divine, and the leaders of other souls, just as the Gods likewise are the leaders of all beings. But partial souls are
Proposition 203. Of every psychical multitude, divine souls are greater in power than, other souls, but less in number. But those which always follow divine souls have a, mediate order among all souls, both in power end quantity. And partial souls are inferior in power to the others, but proceed into a greater number. For divine souls are more allied to The One, on account of a divine hyparxis, but souls of a mediate rank through the participation of intellect, and those of the last order are essentially dissimilar to both those of the mediate and those of the first rank. Among perpetual natures, however, those which are nearer to The One are more single in number, and more contracted in multitude, than those which are more remote from it. But those which are more remote from The One are more multiplied. The powers therefore of superior souls are greater, and have the same ratio to those of souls in the second rank which the divine has to the intellectual, and the intellectual to the psychical peculiarity. And the quantities of inferior souls likewise are more in number. For that which is more remote from The One is a greater multitude and that which is nearer to it is a less multitude.
Proposition 204. Every divine soul is a leader of many souls which always follow the Gods, and of a still greater number of those which occasionally receive this order. For since it is divine it is necessary that it should be allotted an order which is the leader of all things, and which has a primary rank among souls. For in all beings that which is divine is the leader of wholes. It is likewise requisite that every divine soul should neither alone preside over the souls which perpetually follow the Gods, nor over those alone which are occasionally their attendants. For if any divine soul should alone preside over those which occasionally follow the Gods, how can there be a contact between these and a divine soul, since they are entirely different from it, and neither proximately participate of intellect, and much less of the Gods? But if it only presides over those which always follow the Gods, how is it that the causal chain proceeds as far as to these [alone]? For thus intellectual natures would be the last, and un prolific, and unadapted to perfect and elevate. It is necessary, therefore, that the souls which follow the Gods, and energize through intellect, and which are elevated to intellects more partial than divine intellects, should primarily depend on every divine soul: and that second to these it is necessary that there should be the partial souls, which through the divine souls as media are able to participate of intellect and a divine life. For through those which always participate of a superior condition those which only occasionally participate of it are perfected. And again it is necessary that about every divine soul there should be more souls which only occasionally follow the Gods than those which always attend on them. For the power of the monad always proceeds into multitude, through diminution; deficient in
Proposition 205. Every partial soul has the same ratio to the soul under which it is essentially arranged, as the vehicle of the one has to the vehicle of the other. For if the distribution of vehicles to all souls is according to nature, it is necessary that the vehicle of every partial soul should have the same ratio to the vehicle of the soul which ranks as a whole, as the essence of the one has to the essence of the other. The distribution, however, is according to nature. For the things which primarily participate are spontaneously conjoined with the natures which they participate. If, therefore, as a divine soul is to a divine body, so likewise is a partial soul to a partial body, each soul essentially participating,—therefore that which was first asserted is true, that the vehicles of souls have the same ratio to each other, as the souls themselves of which they are the vehicles.
90 See Porphyrii Sententt. VII. VIII.; Nemesius De Natura Hominis cap. III.; Iamblichus in Stobaeus, Eclog. I. cap. 52. (These excerpts are from Iamblichus’ lost book, Περι Ψυχηε). On the οχημα or vehicle of the soul, consult Proclus’ Commentary on the Timaeus, p. 265 sq. Vol. III. ed. Diehl. On the Universal Soul and the particular soul, see Plotinus: En. IV. 1., En. IV. 2. 2.; and the Timaeus, p. 34, which is the fount of all subsequent insights on the subject.
Proposition 206. Every partial soul is able to descend infinitely into generation, and to reascend from generation, to real being.
91 Genesis, η γενεσις. Generation; creation; nativity; rank; a period of time; philosophically used to denote the transition-sphere between the state of ουσια or essence, from the noumenal state to the phenomenal into the world of nature. The movement toward phenomenal existence; the μεταλὴψις or sharing of dual life by a change in mode of being; a becoming as distinguished from really being; relative existence; the passing of the soul or spiritual essence from eternity into nature. On the ninth day of the Eleusinian Mysteries, the worshippers placed two vessels of wine, one at the East and the other at the West, and emptied them in turn, pronouncing the words υιε [son] and τοκυιε [genitrix], as implying that man was the offspring of eternity, and nature his mother. The whole paraphernalia and ceremonial of the Mysteries related to the coming of man into the natural world, and his effort to go hence. “I think we ought to define what that is which is ever-existent and has no genesis; and that which is in a state of transition (γενεσις) or becoming, but never really is. There are three distinct modes that preceded the establishing of this cosmical universe: being, space, and transition” (γενεσις). Plato: Timaeus, IX, XXVII. “Others of the heavenly faculties go forth from them into the nature-sphere of the universe, and into the cosmical universe itself, passing in due order through the sphere of transition and therefrom pervading every part.” Iamblichus: Mysteries, I., XVIII. From γιγνομαι, to become.
This gradation, as here set forth, is sufficiently intelligible to the expert philosophical reader; but it should not be regarded as profaning or popularizing the subject unduly, to attempt an explanation for the convenience of the novitiate, who may not have well learned this mode of speaking and classification. The cosmical universe is here treated as being in two provinces or departments: nature or ϕυσις, the maternal or producing sphere, which includes all things in the visible universe, and genesis, which Mr. Taylor and the other writers render by the term generation. The word, owing to its common meaning in the English language, becomes often an unnecessary cause of obscurity when appearing in philosophical discourses. The Greek word is from the verb to become; to exist as an objective entity; to engender. Hence it means the sphere of transition, or changing; and is here represented as deriving potencies from the astral and divine world and communicating them to the natural. This idea pervades the whole Platonic philosophy. Thus we have the illustration of Plutarchus, that the three Fates, or Weird Sisters, supervise all: one, in the sun, giving the genetic principle; the second, in the moon, mingling it with the lower elements; and the third, in the earth, ordering the results. The divine essence is η ουσια or that which is. Divine essences, as the preceding discourse has shown, are therefore permanent, and of course απαθες,—impassible or unsusceptible of change. It may have been noticed that they are often mentioned in the neuter gender, as including both energy and potency in themselves undivided, like the old androgynous divinities of Mythology. The genesis of the philosophers was the becoming objective and individual; externalization, “becoming”; existence as distinguished from being or essence; transition from the unconditioned to the conditioned; from the Real or noumenal to the phenomenal; from the permanent to the variable: from the eternal to the temporal. The contrast between the two forms, existence or transition, and real being, is very distinctly exhibited in the remarkable utterance of Jesus in the Gnostic Gospel according to John: “Before Abraham came into the transition-sphere, I was the ever being.”
The ψυσις (phusis) or department of nature is the ulterior, the outgrowing; and receives the potencies of life from the world of causation through the intermediary sphere of transition. Sometimes the departments of transition and production, “nature” and “generation,” appear to be treated as one—the Cosmos, or universe. The lower orders which belong there are denominated μεριστος or partible, as being divided and apart from Real Being.—Dr. Alexander Wilder: in his Platonic Technology, (published in The Platonist), and in notes to his translation of Iamblichus.
92 On the descent and reascent of souls from and to the Intelligible World, see the Phaedrus, p. 248, and the Commentary of Hermeias; Prolegomena of Stallbaum to his edition (1820) of the Philebus, p. XXV sq.; Plotinus: En. IV. 8., (On the descent of the Soul into bodies); Nemesius De Natura Hominis, p. 45 sqq., p. 91 sqq., p 111 sqq., ed. Matthaei.
One of the greatest intellectual misfortunes which has befallen mankind is the loss of Porphyry’s work, On the return of the Soul (Περι ανοδου της Ψυχης), several quotations from which St. Augustine has preserved in his De Civitate Dei. Among the principal propositions maintained by Porphyry in this book was, “that we must fly from all body, in order that the soul may abide in felicity with the Deity.”
Proposition 207. The vehicle of every partial soul is fabricated by an immovable cause. For if it is perpetually and connascently attached to the soul which uses it, and by cognation is immutable in essence, it is allotted its hypostasis from an immovable cause. For every thing which is generated from movable causes is essentially changed. Moreover, every soul has a perpetual body, which primarily participates of it. Hence the cause of a partial soul, and therefore of its vehicle, is immovable, and on this account supermundane.
Proposition 208. The vehicle of every partial soul is immaterial, essentially indivisible, and impassive. For if it proceeds from an immovable fabrication,
93 See Plotinus: En. III. 6. 1 sqq; Porphyrii Sententt. XIX.
Proposition 209. The vehicle of every partial soul descends indeed with the addition of more material vestments, but becomes united to the soul by an ablation of every thing material, and a recurrence to its proper form, analogous to the soul which, uses if.
94 The phraseological fount of this is in the Gorgias, p. 523; “Now many, said he, whose souls are poor and wicked are clothed with fair bodies and nobility and wealth,” etc. Proclus (Com. on the First Alcibiades, p. 138, ed. Creuzer). “And hence Plato calls the last vestment of souls the love of fame.” Athenaeus records (XL 116.), on the authority of Dioseorides, in his Memorabilia, that Plato said “the last vestment, the desire of fame, we put off in death itself.” Athenaeus, who was a scurrilous ignoramus and calumniator, incredible as it may seen, quotes this to prove that Plato was very ambitious and vainglorious! Porphyry, in his treatise On Abstinence, a book which cannot be too highly praised, says (I. 31,): “We must therefore put off our many vestments, both this visible and corporeal garment and those with which we are internally clothed, which are proximate to our physical garments; and we must enter the course free and unclothed, striving for [the most glorious of all prizes] the Olympia of the soul.”
The descent of the soul into body separates it from more divine souls, from whom it was filled with thought and power and purity, and conjoins it to generation and nature and material things, from which it is filled with oblivion and wandering and ignorance. For in descending multiform lives and manifold vestments grow upon or adhere to the soul from the universe, drawing it down into a mortal composition, and darkening its vision of real being. It is requisite therefore that the soul which is about to be led rightly from hence to that ever-vigilant nature should amputate those secondary and tertiary powers which are attached to its essence, in the same manner as weeds, stones and shells are attached to the marine Glaucus; should restrain its impulses from externally proceeding, and recollect true beings and a divine essence, from which it descended, and to which it is right that the whole of our life should hasten.–Proclus: Commentary on the First Alcibiades, (p. 75, Vol. III. ed. Cousin.)
Proposition 210. Every connascent vehicle of the soul always has the same figure and magnitude. But it appears to be greater and less and of a dissimilar figure through the additions and ablations of other bodies. For if it derives its essence from an immovable cause, it is evident that both its figure and its magnitude are defined by this cause, and each is immutable and invariable. But at different times it appears to be different, as likewise greater and less. Hence through other bodies, added from the material elements, and again taken away, it exhibits a different appearance both in quantity and form.
Proposition 211. Every partial soul descending into generation descends as a whole; nor does one part of it remain on high, and another part descend. For if part of the soul remains in the Intelligible World it will always think, either without transition, or by a transitive process. But if without transition it will be pure intellect and not a part of the soul, and the partial soul will directly participate of intellect. This however is impossible. Because only the Universal Soul participates directly of Intellect. But if it thinks by a transitive process, then out of that which always thinks and that which occasionally thinks one essence will be formed. This however is likewise impossible. For these always differ, as has been demonstrated. Moreover, it is absurd to suppose that the highest part of the soul which is ever perfect does not rule over the other powers, and cause them to be perfect. Every partial soul, therefore, descends as a whole.
95 Creuzer wrongly asserts that the Platonists did not agree |157| about the descent of the soul, and that one point on which they were at variance was, whether the soul descends as a whole or only a part of it. On all the fundamental principles of Platonic Thought the genuine successors of Plato are at one, though on many propositions, viewed from different standpoints, they may differ, for they were independent thinkers. On the question, as to whether the soul descends as a whole, or a part of it remains in the Intelligible World, the difference is only superficial. Damascius held that the whole soul descends, and yet he says (Περι Αρχων, p. 254, Vol. II. ed. Ruelle): “Moreover, as the self-movable (self-active) nature always uses its self-active power it changes, descending and ascending, It acts essentially, therefore, because the self-active nature moves and is moved essentially…Further, the eternal essence is absolutely immutable, nor does it at one time descend into generation, and at another ascend from generation: it is always on high. If so, its action will always be on high. So in a certain respect the notion of Plotinus that the whole soul does not descend is true, but he does not clearly express or develop this thought. For how is it possible that, one part of the soul remaining in the Intelligible World, another part would be in the ultimate evil? Hence the essence of the soul descends, becoming more partial instead of unical, and genesiurgic instead of essential.”
Damascius further informs us (p. 259) that, according to the great Iamblichus, in his book On the Migration of the Soul from Body, “there is one genus of souls, the highest through participation, which descends into generation, but does not altogether (ὅμως) descend.”
“There were also seasons, and these not unfrequent, during this period of my initiation, when I found myself in a condition of the real nature of which I seemed to find an explanation only when I came upon the writings of the foremost of all the great Neoplatonic school of mystics, Plotinus. This was a condition in which the enhancement of power, physical and mental, was so extraordinary, as to make it seem that it was only necessary to will or to speak to work some great miracle, whether of healing or of destroying. It was not in the least as if one were possessed and filled by something other than one’s proper self; but as if that self, instead of but partially animating the organism, had descended into it in plenitude, completely suffusing it with the spirit, to the indefinite enhancement of every faculty, one effect of which was to suggest the idea that the spiritual part of man does not, as a rule, reside within the man, |158| except to a very limited extent, but hovers over him, descending into him in varying measure according to circumstances.”–Life of Anna Kingsford by Edward Maitland, (p. 132, Vol. I.) Maitland was one of the writers of The Perfect Way, the most mystical book of modern times, and a work of rare interest and value to all students of Occult Science.
“But just as we have seen the supreme Nous resolving itself into a multitude of individual intelligences, so also does the Cosmic Soul produce many lesser or partial souls of which our own is one. Now these derivative souls cannot all be equal, for that would be to defeat the purpose of creation, which is to realize all the possibilities of creation from the highest to the lowest. Thus each has an office corresponding to her place in the scale of perfection.
† “Readers of Pope’s Essay on Man will recognize this argument. It was, in fact, borrowed from Plotinus by Leibnitz, and handed on through Bolingbroke to Pope. There is no better introduction to Neo-Platonism than this beautiful poem.”
Unquestionably there is much Platonism in Pope’s Essay, and the poem is worthy of study, but neither Bolingbroke nor Pope had any comprehensive knowledge of the Philosophy of Plato, and had probably never even heard of Plotinus and the other Platonists, falsely called “Neo-Platonists.”
“We may say of the human soul that she stoops to conquer. Her mission is to cope with the more recalcitrant forms of matter. It is to the struggle with their impurities that the troubles and passions of our life are due. By yielding to earthly temptations we suffer a second fall, and one much more real than the first; by overcoming them, as is perfectly in our power to do, we give scope and exercise to faculties which would otherwise have remained dormant and unknown. Moreover, our soul retains the privilege of returning to its former abode, enriched by the experience acquired in this world, and with that clearer perception of good which the knowledge of its opposite alone can supply. Nay, paradoxical as the assertion may seem, she has not entirely descended to earth, but remains in partial communication with the noetic world by virtue of her reasoning faculty; that is to say, when its intuitions are not darkened and disturbed by the triumph of sensuous impressions over the lower soul.”–Benn: The Greek Philosophers, (Vol. II, pp. 306-7. This passage is quoted as fairiy illustrative, but Mr, Benn’s interpretation as a whole of the thought of Plotinus is glaringly misleading and notably erroneous.
Additional Notes and Elucidative Excerpts
These Notes and Elucidative Excerpts have been moved to the pages on which they originally were cited.
On the Way and Means Whereby the Ascent of the Soul is Effected
Alcibiades. But perhaps I did not answer rightly when I declared that I had myself discovered that knowledge.
Socrates. How, then, did you obtain it?
Alcib. I learned it, I think, like others.
Soc. We come again to the same reason. From whom did you learn it?
Alcib. The multitude.–First Alcibiades, p. 315.
Intellectual Discipline (Μαθησις) has a two-fold nature: at one time proceeding from superior to inferior causes—according to which the Demiurgus, in the Timaeus, says to the subordinate deities, “learn now what, revealing my will, I declare to you”—at another issuing from a cause externally moving—according to which we are accustomed to designate certain persons as instructors. Between these two progressions of Discipline (mathesis) is arranged Discovery (Ευρεσις), for it is inferior to the psychical knowledge imparted by the divinities, and more perfect than reminiscence, which is external, and derived from other things. Concerning the superior progression of Mathesis, Alcibiades had no notion, except so far as he looked to the science which is essentially existent. in us, which was given by the Gods, and according to which he thought that he accurately knew the Just. Coming to Discovery, which is a medium, and is in the soul, likewise a medium, and it having been demonstrated that he had neither investigated nor knew the time of the beginning of his ignorance,—which knowledge it is necessary should preexist investigation,—he now returns to the second progression of Mathesis; and, doubting as to who is a truly scientific instructor of just things, flies to the multitude and the unstable life of the many, and considers this as the leader of the knowledge of just things.
Here therefore Socrates, like a certain Heracles exterminating heads of the Hydra, demonstrates that every multitude is unworthy of belief respecting the knowledge of things just and unjust. This discourse apparently seems to contribute but little to the purification of the young man; but if one accurately considers it, he will find that it is directed to the same end. Primarily, Alcibiades being ambitious, drew his opinion from the multitude, and about it was filled with astonishment. Socrates therefore shows him (1) that the opinion of the multitude has no authority in the judgment and knowledge of things, and that he whose view is directed to the beautiful ought not to adhere to it; (2) that the multitude is the cause of false opinions, producing in us from our youth depraved imaginations and various passions. Scientific reasoning, therefore, is necessary in order to give a right direction to that part of us which is perverted by an association with the multitude, to apply a remedy to our passive part, and to purify that which is filled with im purity; for thus we shall become adapted to a recovery of science. (3) Socrates shows that there is in each of us, as he says, a many-headed wild beast, which is analogous to the multitude: for this is what the people is in a city, viz., the various and material form of the soul, which is our lowest part. The present reasoning, therefore, exhorts us to depart from boundless desire, and to lay aside the multitude of life, and our inward people, as not being a judge worthy of belief respecting the nature of things, nor a recipient of any whole science; for nothing irrational is naturally adapted to par take of science, since the inferior part of irrational things, which likewise has multitude in itself, is contentious, and at war with itself. (4) We therefore say that the present reasoning does not think right to admit into a wise and intellectual life an apostacy and flight from the one, together with diversity and all-various division; but indicates that all these should be rejected as foreign from intellect and divine union. For it is requisite to fly from not only external multitude but likewise from that which is in the soul,—nor this alone, but likewise to abandon multitude of every kind. Beginning therefore from beneath, we must shun the “multitude of men going along in a herd,” as the Oracle says, and must neither participate of their lives nor of their opinions. We must fly from the manifold desires which divide us about body, and which impel us to pursue first one external object and then another—at one time irrational pleasures, and at another indefinite and conflicting actions: for these fill us with penitence and evils. We must likewise fly from the senses which are nourished with us, and which deceive our dianoetic part: for they are multiform at different times, are conversant with different sensibles, and assert nothing sane, nothing accurate, as Socrates himself says. We must likewise shun imaginations, because they are figured and divisible, and thus introduce infinite variety, and do not suffer us to return to that which is impartible and immaterial; but, when we are hastening to apprehend an essence of this kind, draw us clown to passive (sensuous) intelligence. We must likewise avoid opinions, for these are various and infinite, tend to that which is external, are mingled with phantasy and sense, and are not free from contrariety; since our opinions likewise contend with each other in the same manner as imaginations with imaginations, and one sense with another. But, flying from all these divisible and various forms of life, we should run back to science, and there collect in union the multitude of theorems, and comprehend all the sciences in one harmonious bond. For there is “neither sedition nor contrariety of the sciences with each other; but those which are secondary
1 By this first of sciences is meant the Dialectic of Plato.
2 Intellectual vision is intuitive; and hence intellect, by an immediate projection of its visive power, apprehends the objects of its knowledge. Hence, too, the visive energies of intellect are called by the Platonists νοεραι επιβολαι, intellectual intuitions.
3 This illumination is the summit of the dianoetic part.–Taylor.
4 i.e., simple, indemonstrable propositions.–Taylor.
Ascending therefore to this intellect, we must contemplate together with it an intelligible essence; with simple and indivisible intuitions surveying the simple, accurate, and indivisible genera of beings. But, after much-honored intellect, it is necessary to excite the supreme hyparxis or summit of the soul, according to which we are one, and under which the multitude we contain is united. For as by our intellect we participate the divine intellect, so by our unity and as it were the flower of our essence we may participate the First
1 The term salvation is not peculiar to the Christian religion, since long before its establishment the Heathens had their savior Gods.–Taylor.
Hence likewise it is evident that souls do not collect their knowledge from sensibles, nor from things partial and divisible discover the whole and the one, but call forth discipline (μαθησις) from their own nature,
1 Generation signifies, according to Plato and his best disciples, the whole of a sensible nature.–Taylor.
The nature of the soul is essentially unical and simple, but while in the sensuous sphere she develops certain temporary characteristics, forms or parts, viz. Rational, Passionate, and Appetent. As Hermeias, in his valuable Commentary on the Phaedrus, truly says, the soul here is moulded into different forms, and therefore the energies of the soul in connection with the body are not the same as when she dwells among intelligibles. Mr. Archer-Hind well expresses this thought in the Introduction to his edition of the Phaedo: “The three ειδη (forms) of the soul are not different parts or kinds, but only different modes of the soul’s activity under different conditions. The two lower ειδη (forms) are consequent upon the conjunction of soul with matter, and their operation ceases at the separation of soul from matter. Soul as such is simple, she is pure thought; and her action, which is thinking, is simple. But soul immanent in matter has a complex action; she does not lose, at least in the higher organisms, all the faculty of pure thought; but she has another action consequent on her implication with matter: this action we call perception or sensation. The main division is, as we have seen, dual: λογιστικον (the rational) expressing the action of the soul by herself, αλογον (the irrational) her action through the body. The παθη (passions) belonging to αλογον (the irrational) Plato classifies under the heads of θυμοειδες (the passionate)
1 The English equivalents of the Greek words I have inserted, in parentheses.
The celestial or aetherial soul was represented in symbolical writing by the butterfly; an insect which first appears from the egg in the shape of a grub, crawling upon the earth, and feeding upon the leaves of plants. In this state it was aptly made an emblem of man in his earthly form; when the aetherial vigor and activity of the celestial soul, the divinae particula mentis, was clogged and encumbered with the material body. In its next state, the grub becoming a chrysalis appeared by its stillness, torpor and insensibility a natural image of death, or the intermediate state between the cessation of the vital functions of the body, and the emancipation of the soul in the funeral pile: and the butterfly, breaking from this torpid chrysalis, and mounting in the air. afforded a no less natural image of the celestial soul bursting from the restraints of matter, and mixing again with its native aether. Like other animal symbols it was by degrees melted into the human form; the original wings only being retained, to mark its meaning. So elegant an allegory would
—And changing will never be free from toils and transformations until, by following the revolution of the same and the similar within him, he shall vanquish by reason the mob of accretions, tumultous and irrational, adhering to him externally and afterwards from fire, water, air and earth, and shall return to the form of his first and best condition.–Plato: Timaeus, 42 C.
The one salvation of the soul herself, which is extended by the Demiurgus, and which liberates her from the circle of generation, from abundant wandering, and an inefficacious life, is her return to the intellectual form, and a flight from every thing which naturally adheres to us from generation. For it is necessary that the soul, which is hurled like seed into the realms of generation, should lay aside the stubble and bark as it were which she obtained from being disseminated into these fluctuating realms; and that, purifying herself from every thing circumjacent, she should become an intellectual flower and fruit, delighting in an intellectual life instead of doxastic nutriment, and pursuing the uniform and simple energy of the circuit of the Same instead of the abundantly wandering motion of the circuit of the Other. For she contains each of these circles, and two-fold powers. And of her horses one is good, but the other the contrary. And one of these leads her to generation, but the other from generation to True Being:
1 Orphica: Frag 1. 226, translated by Miss Harrison, in her Prolegomena to the Study of Greek Religion, p. 592, a book of extraordinary value and interest. The attention of the student of the Orphic dogmas, which are essentially the same with those of Pythagoras and Plato, is specially called to the text and interpretation of the Orphic Tablets, which appear in this work.
Referring to Ixion, Simplicius says, (Com. Arist. De Coelo. p. 168, ed. Karsten), that “Zeus bound him to a wheel so that he revolved unceasingly with it. The fable perhaps indicates that Ixion undertook to acquire for himself a certain social and lofty power—for this form of life is Herean—but, showing himself unworthy of it, by the judgment of Hera he fell into an unreal, material, and turbid form of such a power, which ‘the cloud’ signifies, he being a turbid and materialistic man. Embracing this phantom Ixion produced a nature (the Centaur) compounded of rational and irrational energies. But he was bound by Zeus the Demiurgus, who distributes every person according to his desert (worth) to the wheel of fate and generation, from which, according to Orpheus, it is impossible for him to be liberated, unless he has propitiated those Gods whom Zeus appointed to release human souls from the circle of generation, and to recover them from evil.”
“The propitiation” of the Gods and the release of the soul follow automatically, so to speak, from repentance, the paying of “the penalty for deeds unrighteous,” and purification.
Timaeus therefore knew the vehicle of the irrational life, which adheres to us prior to this outward body. For that this irrational and tumultous mob, which adheres to us from fire, earth, air and water, does not pertain to the first vehicle, is evident. For, again, this must be urged, because some of the interpreters do not fathom the depth of the theory of Plato concerning the psychical vehicles: some of them, indeed, destroying the first vehicle, are compelled to make the soul to be at times out of all body. But others, preserving it, are forced to immortalize the vehicle of the irrational life,—neither of them separating the connate from the adherent vehicle, the prior from the posterior, and that which was fashioned by the one Demiurgus, from that which was woven to the soul by the many demiurgi, though these are clearly distinguished by Plato. It is evident therefore that this irrational mob is not in the 189 connate vehicle of the soul, into which the Demiurgus caused the soul to enter, for Plato clearly says that “it adhered to the soul afterwards.” It is likewise manifest that neither is it the life in the testaceous body: for if it was, how is it that he says that the soul in changing its bodies will not be free from toils and transformations until it subdues the tumultuous and irrational mob, which afterwards adhered to it? He says therefore that the soul exchanges one life for another, and that the irrational mob adhered to but is not connate with it. For this would be to change that which is appropriate and allied to it. Hence in each of the lives of the soul there is not a mutation of the irrational life, as there is of bodies. This life therefore is different from the entelecheia, which is one in each body, and inseparable from it. For the one is inherent, descending with us into the realms of generation; but the other is changed together with bodies, from which it is inseparable. Hence Timaeus knew that the irrational life is different from the life of the first vehicle, and from the life of the last body. It is different from the former, because he calls it posterior, and from the latter, because it is not changed in conjunction with the outward body. For it is necessary that the soul should subdue it, when it is present to it. For the soul is separated from the entelecheia of the body, and changing its bodies between the life of the ethereal vehicle and the life of the testaceous body it accomplishes the genesiurgic circuit. It is however disturbed by the irrational life. But to the rejection of such vehicles as these, which are mentioned by Plato, who particularly names each of the elements, the philosophic life indeed, as he says, contributes; but in my opinion the telestic art is most efficacious for this purpose,—through divine fire obliterating all the stains arising from generation, as the Oracles teach us, and likewise every thing foreign, which the spirit and the irrational nature of the
Fragments of Ammonius Saccas
Ammonias Saccas, the famous teacher of Plotinus, lived about 175-250 A. D. He was surnamed Saccas (σακκας, a sack-bearer), because his first vocation was that of a carrier of goods from the port of Alexandria, Egypt. Theodoret tells us that Ammonius, abandoning the sacks in which he carried grain, embraced the life of a philosopher. His parents were Christians, and he was brought up as a Christian, but when, says Porphyry, “he began to think for himself, and came in contact with philosophy, he straightway changed to the Hellenic faith.” According to Hierocles, says Bayle, none but men governed by a spirit of contradiction and an itching desire of disputation, or by their prejudices and the darkness of their minds, found any disagreement between the doctrines of Plato and Aristotle: “some voluntarily giving themselves up to strife and madness, others enslaved by prejudice and ignorance. There were a great number of the first kind of these disputants until at length the wisdom of Ammonius, who was called Θεοδιδακτος (taught by God), illluminated the world. For he, having purified the doctrines of the ancient philosophers, and having removed from each all the useless and trifling incrustations, demonstrated that in all fundamental and necessary dogmas Plato and Aristotle were at one.” (Hierocles in the Bibliotheca of Photius, no. 214 p. 171 Vol. I. ed. Bekker). Again: “Many of the nominal followers of Plato and Aristotle wrangled with each other so unscrupulously about the dogmas of their respective masters that they even corrupted
† This is an interesting historical fact, but it seems to have escaped the notice of the historians of philosophy. In the works of Aristotle there are only a few sentences and passages which apparently contradict the doctrines of Plato, and these may be corruptions of the original text made by the crowd of philosophasters who were intent on representing him as an opponent of his Master. They of course changed or interpolated the Aristotelian and Platonic text only to the extent that it was necessary to effect their purpose, and they shrewdly made the contradiction of Plato by Aristotle more apparent than otherwise, since this would cause less suspicion, relying on the fact that the ordinary reader or student never penetrates beyond the surface meaning. But these imposters and rascals reckoned without their host in the case of philosophers of insight, like Ammonius Saccas, Plotinus, Syrianus, etc., who were not prevented by a corrupt text from apprehending the essential harmony of Plato and Aristotle. (It is morally certain that the corruptions were made chiefly in the text of Aristotle, because the writings of Plato had been much more carefully preserved and transmitted, and it was therefore more difficult to change them.) In examining the alleged antagonism of Aristotle to Plato we should always remember that many of the books of Aristotle are lost, and that the text of those which remain is in a more or less imperfect condition. The MSS. of his works, says Prof. Sandys, (History of Classical Literature, p. 86 Vol. I.), “after the capture of Athens by Sulla in 86 B.C., were transported from Athens to Rome, where they were consulted by scholars such as Tyrannion, Andronicus, and others; but, owing to long neglect, many of them had become illegible, and the copies made after they had passed into the hands of Apellicon were disfigured with unskillful conjectures and restorations.” That “the principal doctrines of Aristotle are conformable to those of Plato, and that he differs from his divine Master in appearance only and not in reality,” is conclusively shown by Thomas Taylor, in his elaborate and very valuable Dissertation on the Philosophy of Aristotle, (London, 1812), which I heartily commend to all who are interested in this question. See on this point also the rare and valuable work of Stephanus Theupolus, Academicarum Contemplatiomim Libri Decem, (Venet., 1576).
And this disgraceful innovation in philosophical discussions continued until the time of the divinely-taught Ammonius. He, impelled by a divine impulse to search for philosophic truth, despised the opinions of the many who had brought much discredit on philosophy, and
* For this translation I am indebted to my daughter, Helen M. Johnson, A. M.
An English version of Nemesius’ work by George Wither, a poet, satirist and political writer, was published in 1636. His knowledge of Greek was limited, and his ignorance of Philosophy was unlimited. It is said that Sir John Denham went to King |193| Charles II and begged him not to hang Wither, (who was imprisoned and in danger of losing his life), because “whilest G. W. lived he should not be the worst poet in England.”
I. Bodies, being by their very nature mutable, wholly dissoluble and infinitely divisible, nothing remaining in them which is immutable, need a principle to bring them together, to join them, to bind and hold them in unity, and this principle we call the soul. Now, if the soul is a body of any kind, even if it is the most subtle or refined, what again is that which holds it together? For it has been shown that every body requires a connecting and binding principle to hold it together, and this will be true of every body ad infinitum. until we reach an incorporeal principle. If they should say, as the Stoics do, for instance, that there is a certain tense motion in or about bodies, extending at the same time to the internal and external parts of bodies, and that this motion tending outward is the cause of quantities and qualities, and tending inward is the cause of unity and essence, then we must ask them,—since every motion proceeds from some power, what is this power, and in what lies its essence? If this power is a certain matter, we will again use the same arguments. If it is not matter but a material thing—for a material thing is different from matter, since that which participates of matter is called material—what then is that which participates of matter? Is it matter or something immaterial? If it is matter, how can it be material and not matter?
* The materialists, driven from their position that the soul was matter, alleged that it was a material principle, or a principle inherent in matter. But this opinion is no more tenable than the other. Either this principle is matter, or it is immaterial. If they say that it is matter, they involve themselves in a contradiction, since they have affirmed that the soul is not matter but a material principle, and therefore their argument becomes an absurdity, because it maintains that this material principle is matter—since it must be either matter or immaterial—without being matter. But if this material principle is matter, their opinion is wholly destroyed by the preceding arguments: if, on the contrary, this principle is not matter, it is immaterial; and if it is immaterial, it is not a body.–Dehaut.
II. We must now investigate how the union of the soul and an inanimate body arises. Ammonius, the teacher of Plotinus, solved the question in this way.
He said that intelligible things have such a 195 nature that, when they are united to the things which are able to receive them, they are not changed like corruptible things, but remain distinct and indestructible, just like things which are laid side by side. With respect to bodies, union with each other changes them entirely, because they are changed into other bodies, just as the elements are changed into compound bodies, nourishment into blood, blood into flesh and the other parts of the body. As to intelligible natures, union may arise but there is no change of essence as a result: for an intelligible thing by reason of its nature does not change its essence, but it either departs or vanishes into non existence, but its nature does not admit of change. Nor is it corruptible into non-existence, for in this case it would not be immortal. The soul, being life itself, if it was changed in the mixture or union would be different and no longer life. But what advantage would the soul be to the body, unless it supplied life to it? The soul therefore is not changed essentially in the union. Thus, it having been demonstrated that intelligible natures are immutable in essence, it necessarily follows that they do not perish with the things to which they are united. The soul is intimately united to the body, but yet remains totally distinct. That it is united to the body, sympathy with the body shows; for the whole animal sympathizes with itself as one being,—that it remains distinct is evident from the fact that in a certain way the soul can withdraw from the body in sleep and, leaving it lying like a corpse, the body only preserving in itself the breath of life, in order that it may not wholly perish, it acts by and of itself in dreams, foretelling the future, and approaching intelligible things. The same thing happens when the soul by and of itself apprehends any intelligible nature: for then as much as possible the soul separates itself from the bodv, and isolates itself, in order
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Proclus Diadochus
412–485 AD
The Successor, the Neoplatonic philosopher in Late Antiquity,
head of the Platonic Academy
in Athens for 50 years.
Works Cited
Proclus’ Metaphysical Elements. Thos. M. Johnson, Editor of The Platonist, trans., Osceola. MO: 1909.
Dedication To William T. Harris, LL. D., the Greatest American Thinker, who for over fifty years has battled in defense of God, Freedom and Immortality, against sottish atheists and materialists, this book is dedicated as an expression of admiration and friendship. (William Torrey Harris [1835-1909] was an American educator, philosopher, and lexicographer. He served as United States Commissioner of Education 1889-1906. Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel was a German philosopher and an important figure of German idealism.)