Opuscula psychologica, theologica, daemonologica

 After the judgment of the thoughts, an exact discernment of how the thoughts happen to be, whether they are good or otherwise but imagination is the

 to divide for us, by the established terms, the sesquitertian ratios into both the sesquioctave ratios and the leimmata, we would have stopped at thes

 having split it, he bent each one into a circle, bringing them together middle to middle with each other like a chi, having joined 7 them both to them

 left, or rather the one is an image of mind, the other of soul. And in the soul itself, the right is that which is turned toward the intelligible thin

 regarding the explanation of the Platonic psychogony, this we now discharge for you as a kind of debt. For Plato's statement that the division of thes

 and of exegesis. And there is a letter of mine placed among my books that has traced out and carefully examined the meaning in the sayings. But it is

 a ruler drives a team of two then of the 14 horses, one of them is noble and good and of such stock, but the other is from opposite stock and is oppo

 a body from one of the seeing things, such that it is able to be extended as far as the stars. But it was better, he says, than to say that the extern

 through which it is not swept into material disorder, but is joined to the divine light, holds it in its own place and makes it unmixed with matter, l

 of knowledge. For there is something intelligible, which you must understand with the flower of the intellect. And he says that the one in us is twofo

 agrees, but among them the salty is more than the drinkable. They say, for example, that every soul is either divine or changing from intellect to min

 to be deemed worthy of pardon in repenting. If the soul is a body according to some of the ancients, what is it that contains it? every body is three-

 distinction. Two kinds of air according to Aristotle, the vaporous from the exhalation of water and the smoky from the extinguishing of fire. The latt

 Plato. Pleasure is not a coming-to-be for coming-to-be is of things that are not, while pleasure is of things that are. And coming-to-be is swift and

 is natural, while habit is acquired and taught. Providence is the care for existing things that comes from God. Epicurus says: the blessed and incorr

 but such powers are simply and imperceptibly desired. What then? Do we have three souls? Solution: just as the soul, when united to the body, seems to

 When this is dimmed they also are dimmed the soul flourishes when this 34 withers. Further, everything desires to preserve its own substrate. If the

 actuality, as physicians, others in relation to something, others a double or one-and-a-half ratio. Potentiality is found in substance, as a man in th

 concerning form, matter and cause, for example the matter of the celestial bodies is not the four elements, but a certain fifth, spherical one, as be

 as knowledge (for knowledge is a transition from defined things to defined things for this reason it is also knowledge, as leading the mind to a stat

 this, for indeed the flesh also moves downwards and is none of the elements. Aporia: but matter, that is the element, is not soul, but the form that c

 definitions have as their beginning the most general things, as their end the most specific things. If, then, these are finite, so are the definitions

 and it acts according to one part and another. It seems to act in these ways as being one. For if it is divided, it is necessary for the parts to be e

 the rest, but this is about hot and soft, heavy and light, rare and dense, and many opposites. In humans, the cause of local motion is intellect, in i

 is nourished {which} is twofold: either as Matter or as an instrument. And the instrument is twofold: either moving and being moved, like the innate h

 is equal in distance to the zodiac signs. Light is not a body. for if it were a body, how would it be possible for it to have instantaneous movement,

 we see the introduction of the forms of things seen entering the sight, but how do we see the interval of the air in between? Solution: It is not that

 with a violent collision. In soft things no sound is produced, because the air is broken up in their pores and dispersed as in sponges. In things that

 a buzzing which is conveyed back to the sense of hearing. Others say that the sound occurring in the ears after the blockage is of the external air th

 For instance, fish, not having this, are cooled through their gills. Those that have a windpipe also have a lung. Fish have neither these nor a heart.

 the sense organs of touch, it is clear for every sense organ is both separated and known. Aristotle speaks of the senses both as one each and as many

 Aristotle in On the Soul : if sensation ceased, the sense-organ would also cease. But if the second is not, neither is the first. Sensation and sense-

 Some add also a sixth, the attentive [faculty], as when a man says, I perceived, I thought, I opined. To this part they also add the activities of t

 We can say ten, but not indeed opine it, so that opinion is not up to us. But neither do we imagine what we wish for we see at night what we do not w

 in the case of children, the one according to state, and the one in act, as the one governing all things or the one entering from without. Plato says

 theoretical versus the practical. The theoretical corresponds to a vision discerning of forms, while the practical corresponds to a vision not only kn

 organs. Moreover, at night the nutritive faculty is more active, but the locomotive faculty is not at all. A difficulty: the vegetative faculty produc

 simpler, or rather the things inherent in the matter, into which the matter is also divided, which are also prop[erly] called its elements. I say then

 he hints that it is not completed from both of the things mixed, but is produced in the union of the soul and the body, not by the soul itself giving

 closing the senses, so as to know unknowingly the transcendent substance of that which is. For according to their own opinions, the philosopher who ha

 he himself will also pardon his own student for the apparent 78 opposition to him and others will come here again to bear witness for us, the philoso

 it grows and is naturally constituted to decay, must in every way grow along with and decay along with the other in a connate manner for that by whic

 a demonstration, so also the soul in an infant's body and a more imperfect one, if it were in another, perfect body, would immediately have shown its

 I shall use the argument. In what do you say virtue is inherent? or again, is it superimposed on the formless and incorporeal and uncompounded nature,

 Porphyry has philosophized in harmony with this. For in discussing the soul, he says: “Just as insomniacs, by the very act of wanting to sleep and wat

 have they cast off? Perhaps those who hold the contrary opinion will vex us with these things. But their objection is like a spider's web, which will

 to have received watchwords from the first father, nor that they possess the fullness of many bosoms, nor would I accept that they stand before the bo

 both the Sibylline and the Orphic ones, and those according to which the Berytian Bulls came to be and Amous the Egyptian, and Socrates and Plato (for

 of the bonds by which they were bound, and after this, turning their minds upward, they will approach God. And if the account told about the Sibyl wer

 has the front part? What then do you think? a mind scattered in so great a size is from this cause for him both slack and weak, and the soul is simply

 would remember any of the things here. But as many of the souls as were allotted to more humble portions and their whole mind has not been snatched aw

 Let us not altogether reject the analogy of the eye in the case of the soul, let it be and be called a more precise substance of the soul but if some

 The manner of the entry of souls, and likewise of their release or separation from hence, both are most difficult or hard to explain for of the first

 but by such powers the soul is led like some kind of thing moved by another, being drawn towards whatever the leaders happen to lead it, but then rath

 For that which is according to reason, knowledge is readily at hand, but that which is contrary to reason, is so because it has received such a nature

 of beasts, but perhaps the matter which reason has shown not to exist. Therefore our bodies will be resurrected, and there will be nothing to prevent

 fitting and gluing it to that by means of a suitable analogy, not placing the rational and intellectual substance into any of the animals for this is

 are generated from these powers alone, for this reason, having abandoned the others, they divided the substance of the soul into these alone. But if y

 it is in fourths, when one might contemplate these both in the third order of the intellectual virtues and in the fourth of the paradigmatic virtues,

 and so interpreting the Platonic opinion, but they do not seem to me to have grasped the precise meaning of his doctrine. But if I shall clarify for y

 and with nothing separating them, it is necessary for the one to be ordered, and the other to order and the one which is ordered has its form divided

 what is hard and resistant in them has been smoothed out by me. But what follows from this must be attributed to them alone for, proposing to speak a

 proceeds from it and returns to it.” Then indeed he works out the point by division. For if it only remained, it would in no way differ from its cause

 in our sacred writings, neither a whole soul nor any whole nature, apart from the partial ones, has been dogmatically established1. I for my part reje

 by the energy, then also the substance is perfected according to it, and these things stand in each other according to one energy. For he who does not

 having a life activated according to intellect and reason the psychic is defined according to reason 124 and takes care of divisible souls the physi

 tormenting them. But there are, they say, both on earth divine daimons and in the air, guardians of the animals there, and <in> the water, extending t

 make it superior to the confusion of life, but, if possible, may you not even leave behind in the terrestrial world the very body which you have put o

 cast under your mind: for there is no plant of truth on earth» that is: do not busy your mind with the great measures of the earth, as the geographer

 Gregory by reason and contemplation leads the soul up to the more divine things by reason that is according to us, the more intellectual and better,

 such a lion-bearing fount of heaven and the stars, but the ruling part of its own existence conceals the vision of them. Chaldaean Oracle. From all si

 often appearing, they feign the semblance of some goodness towards the one being initiated. Chaldean Oracle. The soul of mortals will draw God into it

 they can. Whence everything they say and show is false and insubstantial for they know existing things through forms but that which knows future thi

 and fear is the holding back of his goodness towards us for the sake of the economy. Chaldean Oracle. The Father snatched himself away, not even enclo

 they are possessed by passions. Therefore, it is necessary for these also to receive their part of the whole judgment and, having been filled up with

 for it is higher than being venerated, than being uttered, and than being conceived. A Chaldean Oracle. The Iynges, being conceived by the Father, the

 an unknown password, spoken and unspoken. And they often bring the soul down 148 into the world for many reasons, either through the shedding of its w

 of truth and of love. After which are the demiurgic fountains, such as that of the ideas, according to which the cosmos and the things in it have shap

 enclosing the triad towards itself and they call these also intelligible. After these, another order of the intelligible and at the same time intelle

 to the setting [sun], and the pit to the one just at mid-heaven. And thus, gently separating the membrane of the liver, [which is placed] upon the org

 parts of philosophy is necessary. For according to moral philosophy it is necessary to assume that not all things are and come to be by necessity, but

 knowledge and sees not only the essences themselves, but also their powers and their activities, both those according to nature and those contrary to

 he acquired. For even before the birth of both, God knew that the one would be good, and the other would turn out bad and this knowledge is an unchan

 from the one who knows, and it revolves around the thing known and is made like the one who knows. I mean something like this: the knowledge of the so

 they fabricate. For I too had a certain little man, ignoble in soul, but by no means the least of storytellers to him, at any rate, such phantoms pre

is natural, while habit is acquired and taught. Providence is the care for existing things that comes from God. Epicurus says: "the blessed and incorruptible being neither has troubles itself nor provides them for another." many things according to providence are not the works of nature; for nature is a part of providence. For three reasons there would be no providence: either in God's not knowing what is good, or in His not willing it, or in His not being able to do it. And the three are absurd. They say "He does not will it, not through laziness, but for another and a second reason, because it is unseemly." If he is not able to exercise providence, it is either because it is not in his nature or because particular things are not receptive of providence. And both are absurd. Just as the craftsman is to the crafted object, a builder to a house and a father to his offspring. Various and diverse collections Of the powers of the soul, some are rational, some are irrational; of the rational, some are vital and appetitive, some are cognitive; likewise also the irrational. Again, the rational and cognitive powers are divided into opinion, discursive thought, and intellect. Opinion, then, is concerned with the universal sensible, that every man is a biped, and with the conclusions of discursive thought without the reasoning, for example, that the soul is immortal; but it does not know the "why"; for this belongs to discursive thought. According to Plato, opinion is the end-point of discursive thought. For discursive thought [moves] through a proposition to a conclusion, which opinion alone knows. But the intellect knows beyond what is known by demonstration 31. And this happens to those who have reached the extreme of purification and knowledge. Intellect is the most perfect state of the soul. Intellect is concerned with intelligible things, discursive thought with things of discursive thought, opinion with things of opinion. Plotinus: "Let the young be led through mathematics toward becoming accustomed to the eternal nature." A difficulty, if it is not possible to establish the universal from the particulars; for not because this horse is blond or white, are all horses. or is it by discursive thought or by imagination or sensation? How is it possible for discursive thought, according to opinion, to infer the universal in sensible things? As Aristotle shows through the moon that all stars are spherical as being of the same substance, so also opinion, having learned from the senses that Socrates and Plato are bipeds, recalls, as it were, and opines that every man is a biped. Practical, rational, cognitive. Will is of the good only, and choice is of both. And will belongs only to the rational soul, but choice belongs to the soul intertwined with irrationality, that is, after <it> has entered the body. Of the irrational powers, some are vital and appetitive, some are cognitive. Sensation is concerned with external and present things, imagination with internal things, which Aristotle also calls intellect as having the known object within, passive as having the known object not without form but with impressions. Imagination receives the impressions of the five senses, but each sense receives its own. Of the appetitive powers, spirit and desire. But what? Does not the spirited man desire this, and the rational man desire wisdom? Just as disposition is spoken of both in itself and in relation to habit, so also desire appears in both and in itself. There are also the nutritive powers: nutritive, augmentative, generative. We therefore have the rational powers as rational beings, the irrational powers as animals, and the vegetative powers as living things. Therefore, those who have the rational powers also have the irrational ones, but not vice versa, just as those who have eyes and hearing also have the other senses, but not vice versa, as moles are without sight, and sponges <partake> of touch alone. 32 Nature, desiring the eternity of the first being, contrived this: that each natural thing should beget another. And since generation occurs at a determined size, we require growth, which requires the nutritive power. When we act as men, we act rationally; as irrational beings, when we act according to spirit and desire; and when according to the nutritive and augmentative powers, as plants. And Plotinus says, "Those who act frantically according to the nutritive powers are in danger of being turned into trees." Desire differs from the nutritive <and> augmentative power, because it does what it does through sensation, and with pleasure; the

φυσική ἐστιν, ἡ δὲ ἕξις ἐπείσακτος καὶ διδακτή. Πρόνοιά ἐστιν ἡ ἐκ θεοῦ εἰς τὰ ὄντα γινομένη ἐπιμέλεια. Ἐπίκουρός φησι· «τὸ μακάριον καὶ ἄφθαρτον οὔτ' αὐτὸ πράγματα ἔχει οὔτ' ἄλλῳ παρέχει». πολλὰ τῶν κατὰ πρόνοιαν οὐκ ἔστι φύσεως ἔργα· μέρος γὰρ προνοίας ἡ φύσις. διὰ τρεῖς αἰτίας οὐκ ἂν εἴη πρόνοια· ἢ ἐν τῷ μὴ γινώσκειν τὸν θεὸν τί τὸ καλόν, ἢ τῷ μὴ βούλεσθαι, ἢ τῷ μὴ δύνασθαι. καὶ τὰ τρία ἄτοπα. φασίν «οὐ βούλεται, οὐ διὰ ῥαθυμίαν, ἀλλὰ δι' ἕτερον καὶ δεύτερον τρόπον, διὰ τὸ ἀπρεπές». εἰ οὐ δύναται προνοεῖν, ἢ διὰ τὸ αὐτὸν μὴ πεφυκέναι ἢ διὰ τὸ μὴ τὰ καθέκαστα προνοίας εἶναι δεκτικά. καὶ ἀμφότερα δὲ ἄτοπα. ὅπερ ὁ τεχνίτης πρὸς τὸ τεχνηθέν, οἰκοδόμος πρὸς οἰκίαν καὶ πρὸς τὸ γεννηθὲν ὁ πατήρ. Συλλογαὶ διάφοροι καὶ ποικίλαι Τῶν ψυχικῶν δυνάμεων αἱ μὲν λογικαί, αἱ δὲ ἄλογοι· τῶν λογικῶν αἱ μὲν ζωτικαὶ καὶ ὀρεκτικαί, αἱ δὲ γνωστικαί· ὁμοίως καὶ αἱ ἄλογοι. πάλιν αἱ λογικαὶ καὶ γνωστικαὶ διαιροῦνται εἰς δόξαν, διάνοιαν, νοῦν. ἡ οὖν δόξα καταγίνεται περὶ τὸ καθόλου αἰσθητόν, ὅτι πᾶς ἄνθρωπος δίπους, καὶ τῶν διανοητικῶν ἄνευ λόγου τὰ συμπεράσματα, οἷον ἡ ψυχὴ ἀθάνατος· τὸ διατί δὲ οὐκ οἶδε· διανοίας γὰρ τοῦτο. κατὰ Πλάτωνα δόξα διανοίας ἀποτελεύτησις. ἡ γὰρ διάνοια [μεταβαίνει] διὰ προτάσεως εἰς συμπέρασμα, ὃ οἶδεν ἡ δόξα μόνον. ὁ δὲ νοῦς ἐπέκεινα τῶν κατὰ ἀπόδειξιν 31 οἶδε. γίνεται δὲ τοῦτο τοῖς εἰς ἄκρον καθάρσεως καὶ ἐπιστήμης γεγονόσι. νοῦς ἐστὶ ἕξις τῆς ψυχῆς τελειοτάτη. ὁ νοῦς καταγίνεται περὶ τὰ νοητά, διάνοια περὶ τὰ διανοητά, δόξα περὶ τὰ δοξαστά. Πλωτῖνος· «ἀγέσθωσαν οἱ νέοι διὰ τῶν μαθημάτων πρὸς συνεθισμὸν τῆς ἀιδίου φύσεως.» Ἀπορία, εἰ μὴ δυνατὸν ἐκ τῶν μερικῶν τὸ καθόλου πιστώσασθαι· οὐ γάρ, ἐπειδὴ ξανθὸς ἢ λευκὸς ὁ ἵππος, καὶ πάντες. ἢ κατὰ διάνοιαν ἢ κατὰ φαντασίαν ἢ αἴσθησιν; πῶς κατὰ δόξαν δυνατὸν τὴν διάνοιαν τὸ ἐν τοῖς αἰσθητοῖς καθόλου συλλογίσασθαι; ὡς Ἀριστοτέλης δείκνυσι διὰ τῆς σελήνης ὅλα τὰ ἄστρα σφαιρικὰ ὡς ὁμοούσια, οὕτω καὶ ἡ δόξα, ὑπὸ τῆς αἰσθητοῖς μαθοῦσα ὅτι ὁ Σωκράτης καὶ Πλάτων δίπους, ἀναμιμνήσκεται οἷον καὶ πάντα ἄνθρωπον δίπουν δοξάζει. Πρακτικαί, λογικαί, γνωστικαί. βούλησις ἡ τοῦ ἀγαθοῦ μόνου καὶ προαίρεσις ἡ τῶν ἀμφοτέρων. καὶ ἡ μὲν βούλησις τῆς λογικῆς μόνον ψυχῆς, ἡ δὲ τῆς συμπεπλεγμένης τῇ ἀλογίᾳ, ἤγουν μετὰ <τὸ> ὑπελθεῖν τῷ σώματι. Τῶν ἀλόγων αἱ μὲν ζωτικαὶ καὶ ὀρεκτικαί, αἱ δὲ γνωστικαί. αἴσθησις ἡ περὶ τὰ ἐκτὸς καὶ τὸ παρόν, φαντασία ἡ περὶ τὰ ἐντός, ἣν καὶ νοῦν καλεῖ ὁ Ἀριστοτέλης ὡς ἔνδον ἔχουσαν τὸ γνωστόν, παθητικὸν ὡς οὐκ ἀσχηματίστως ἀλλὰ μετὰ τύπων ἔχουσαν τὸ γνωστόν. ἡ φαντασία τῶν πέντε αἰσθήσεων δέχεται τοὺς τύπους, ἡ δὲ αἴσθησις ἑκάστη τὸ ἴδιον. τῶν ὀρεκτικῶν θυμὸς καὶ ἐπιθυμία. τί δέ; οὐκ ἐπιθυμεῖ καὶ ὁ θυμούμενος τοῦδε καὶ ὁ λογικὸς σοφίας; ὥσπερ ἡ διάθεσις λέγεται καὶ καθ' αὑτὴν καὶ ἐπὶ τῆς ἕξεως, οὕτω καὶ ἐπιθυμία καὶ ἐν τοῖς δυσὶ φαίνεται καὶ καθ' ἑαυτήν. εἰσὶ καὶ αἱ θρεπτικαὶ δυνάμεις θρεπτική, αὐξητική, γεννητική. Ἡμεῖς οὖν ἔχομεν καὶ τὰς λογικὰς ὡς λογικοί, ὡς ζῷα τὰς ἀλόγους, ὡς ἔμψυχα τὰς φυτικάς. οἱ ἔχοντες τοιγαροῦν τὰς λογικὰς ἔχουσι καὶ τὰς ἀλόγους, οὐ μὴν καὶ ἀνάπαλιν, ὡς οἱ ἔχοντες ὀφθαλμοὺς καὶ ἀκοὴν καὶ τὰς λοιπὰς αἰσθήσεις, οὐ μὴν καὶ ἀνάπαλιν, ὡς οἱ ἀσπάλακες χωρὶς ὄψεως, οἱ σπόγγοι ἁφῆς μόνης <μετέχοντες>. 32 Ἡ φύσις ἐφιεμένη τῆς τοῦ πρώτου ἀιδιότητος τοῦτο ἐσκόπησε, τὸ τῶν φυσικῶν ἕκαστον γεννῆσαι ἄλλο. καὶ ἐπειδὴ ἡ γέννησις ἐν ὡρισμένῳ γίνεται μεγέθει, δεόμεθα αὐξήσεως, ἥτις ἐδεήθη τῆς θρεπτικῆς δυνάμεως. ὅταν ἐνεργοῦμεν ὡς ἄνθρωποι, λογικῶς ἐνεργοῦμεν· ὡς ἄλογοι, ὅταν κατὰ θυμὸν καὶ ἐπιθυμίαν· καὶ ὅταν κατὰ τὰς θρεπτικὰς καὶ αὐξητικάς, ὡς φυτά. καὶ ὁ Πλωτῖνος «ὅσοι» φησί «κατὰ τὰς θρεπτικὰς δυνάμεις ἐμμανῶς ἐνεργοῦσι κινδυνεύουσιν ἀποδενδρωθῆναι». Ἡ ἐπιθυμία διαφέρει τῆς θρεπτικῆς <καὶ> αὐξητικῆς, ὅτι δι' αἰσθήσεως ποιεῖ, ὃ ποιεῖ, καὶ ἡδέως· αἱ