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
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 away, but the ascent has happened in part, for these, that which has not ascended thither turns back here through a sympathetic disposition and their relation is not at all completely cut off. But those that have not ascended at all to God, since they have not been purely released from their bodies, but, so to speak, have been qualified in their relations by their passions, are forgetful of nothing that they have beheld here. But such an affection is not similar for souls with bodies and for those released from them, just as is no other of the things said concerning the soul. For all things are more precise for the soul stripped of its body than for one still nailed to its fetter. Concerning the lack of turning back to things here on account of the precision of the purification and the immeasurable nature of the illumination and know this also, that the soul thus disposed sometimes receives from God a charge over the souls held here, and providence sets it over the economies of nations and the administrations of cities. 95 But the manner of its supervision is a certain wondrous one; for in managing the things here it does not, as it were, become occupied and cut off from the illumination, but for it both contemplation and governance are established without division, with neither the former being diminished by its inclinations towards things here nor the latter being neglected by its gazes thither. That the mind is not the eye of the soul This question you have now indeed made a problem, but many of the philosophers, both our own and those from without, take it as an accepted fact in their investigations concerning the soul and openly declare the mind to be the eye of the soul. But I was always disturbed at them agreeing in some such way on what is contrary to the word of truth, but in response to your question I say this with precision, that the mind is not the eye of the soul. For the one is a subordinate instrument, moved by another and roused to perception, but the mind is a principle of the soul, and leads it up to the more divine illuminations, both filling it with divine light from above and making it full of the more immaterial forms. Nor is it a faculty of it; for it is a ruling and eternal substance, surpassing the soul in power and beauty and in all prerogatives, and not being of it but making the soul its own, nor being seated upon it but seating it in itself. But again, the soul, by supporting itself on the mind, has not departed from its own self-motion; for being what it is, self-moved, it is rather strengthened from thence and 96 uses its faculties more precisely. For even if Aristotle declared the soul to be an unwritten tablet, he does not think this, that it does not partake of the immaterial forms in the principle of its substance, but that the secret letters are impressed upon it from above by the mind, but rather that, possessing them indistinctly and ignorantly, through the application and illumination of the mind it attains to them purely and transparently. Nor is the perfect mind, as you say, sufficient for it for the fulfillment of the more divine forms; for that one is entirely unparticipated, as is any other superior substance, but the mind in the soul is subordinate to that one and is participated, presiding over the psychical substance and illuminating it. Therefore, since these things have been thus defined, do not suppose mind and soul to be the same. For the one is unmoved, but the other is self-moved, and the one is eternal both in substance and in activity, but the other is stable in substance, but changes in its activities, and the one is always present to the superior orders, but the other, according to its double faculty, looks in both directions and now is led by the better part, now by the other, and the one, without being moved, possesses the intelligible, but the other would conclude nothing of the things that are, unless it were moved through propositions. But in order that
τῶν τῇδε τινὸς μνημονεύσειεν. ὅσαι δὲ τῶν ψυχῶν ταπεινοτέραις ἀπεκληρώθησαν λήξεσι καὶ οὐχ ὅλος ὁ νοῦς αὐταῖς ἀφήρπασται,
ἀλλ' ἐκ μέρους ἡ ἀναγωγὴ γέγονε, ταύταις τὸ μὴ ἐκεῖσε ἀναβεβηκὸς ἐνταῦθα διὰ τῆς συμπαθοῦς διαθέσεως στρέφεται καὶ οὐκ ἀποκέκοπταί
γε παντελῶς ἡ σχέσις αὐταῖς. αἱ δὲ μηδόλως ἀναβᾶσαι πρὸς τὸν θεὸν ἅτε μὴ καθαρῶς τῶν σωμάτων ἀπαλλαγεῖσαι, ἀλλ' οἷον εἰπεῖν
τοῖς πάθεσι ποιωθεῖσαι ταῖς σχέσεσιν, οὐδενὸς ἀμνημονοῦσιν ὧν ἐνταῦθα τεθέανται. τὸ δὲ τοιοῦτον πάθημα οὐχ ὅμοιόν ἐστι ταῖς
τε μετὰ σωμάτων ψυχαῖς καὶ ταῖς ἀπαλλαγείσαις ἐκείνων, ὥσπερ οὐδ' ἄλλο τι τῶν περὶ ψυχὴν λεγομένων. ἀκριβέστερα <γὰρ> σύμπαντα
τῇ γυμνωθείσῃ τῶν σωμάτων τῆς ἔτι τῇ πέδῃ προσηλωμένης. Περὶ τῆς ἀνεπιστρόφου πρὸς τὰ ἐνταῦθα διὰ τὸ ἀκριβὲς τῆς καθάρσεως
καὶ τὸ ἄμετρον τῆς ἐλλάμψεως καὶ τοῦτο ἴσθι ὡς ἐπιτροπήν ποτε ἡ οὕτως ἔχουσα παρὰ θεοῦ δέχεται τῶν ἐνταῦθα κατεχομένων ψυχῶν,
καὶ ἐφιστᾷ ταύτην ἡ πρόνοια ἐθνῶν οἰκονομίαις καὶ πόλεων διοικήσεσιν. 95 ἀλλὰ θαυμαστός τις αὐτῇ ὁ τρόπος τῆς ἐπιστασίας ἐστίν·
οὐ γὰρ οἰκονομοῦσα τὰ τῇδε ὥσπερ ἄσχολος γίνεται καὶ ἀποτέμνεται τῆς ἐλλάμψεως, ἀλλ' ἀμέριστος αὐτῇ ἥ τε θεωρία καὶ ἡ προστασία
καθίσταται, μήτ' ἐκείνης ἐλαττουμένης ταῖς πρὸς τὰ τῇδε νεύσεσι μήτε ταύτης ἀθετουμένης ταῖς ἐκεῖσε ἐνατενίσεσιν. Ὅτι οὐκ
ἔστιν ὁ νοῦς ὀφθαλμὸς τῆς ψυχῆσ Τοῦτο δὴ τὸ ἐρώτημα νῦν μὲν σὺ πεποίηκας πρόβλημα, οἱ δέ γε πολλοὶ τῶν φιλοσόφων τῶν τε ἡμετέρων
καὶ τῶν θύραθεν ὡμολογημένον ἐν τοῖς περὶ ψυχῆς λαμβάνουσι σκέμμασι καὶ τὸν νοῦν ὀφθαλμὸν τῆς ψυχῆς ἀναφανδὸν ἀποφαίνονται.
ἐγὼ δὲ πρὸς μὲν ἐκείνους διεταραττόμην ἀεὶ οὕτω πως περὶ τοῦ ἐναντίου τῷ τῆς ἀληθείας λόγῳ ὁμογνωμονοῦντας, πρὸς δὲ τὴν σὴν
ἐρώτησιν ταυτὶ λέγω διακριβούμενος ὡς οὐκ ἔστιν ὀφθαλμὸς ὁ νοῦς τῆς ψυχῆς. ὁ μὲν γὰρ ὑπηρετικόν ἐστιν ὄργανον ὑφ' ἑτέρου κινούμενον
καὶ πρὸς αἴσθησιν διεγειρόμενον, ὁ δέ γε νοῦς κατάρχων ἐστὶ τῆς ψυχῆς καὶ ἀνάγων μὲν αὐτὴν πρὸς τὰς θειοτέρας ἐλλάμψεις θείου
τε ἄνωθεν φωτὸς ἐμπιπλῶν καὶ τῶν ἀυλοτέρων εἰδῶν πλήρη ποιῶν. ἀλλ' οὐδὲ δύναμις ἐκείνης ἐστίν· οὐσία γάρ ἐστιν ἀρχικὴ καὶ
αἰώνιος καὶ δυνάμει καὶ κάλλει καὶ τοῖς ὅλοις πρεσβείοις ὑπερανέχουσα τῆς ψυχῆς, καὶ οὐκ ἐκείνης οὖσα ἀλλ' ἑαυτῆς τὴν ψυχὴν
ποιουμένη, οὐδ' ἐπ' ἐκείνης ἑδραζομένη ἀλλ' ἐν αὑτῇ ταύτην ἑδράζουσα. ἀλλ' οὐδὲ αὖθις ἡ ψυχὴ τῷ νῷ αὑτὴν ἐπερείσασα τῆς οἰκείας
αὐτοκινησίας ἐξέστηκεν· οὖσα γὰρ ὅπερ ἐστὶν αὐτοκίνητος ἐπιρρώννυται μᾶλλον ἐκεῖθεν καὶ ἀκριβέστερον 96 κέχρηται ταῖς δυνάμεσιν.
εἰ γὰρ καὶ ἄγραφον γραμματεῖον ὁ Ἀριστοτέλης τὴν ψυχὴν ἀπεφήνατο, ἀλλὰ οὐ τοῦτο οἴεται, μὴ μετέχειν μὲν αὐτὴν τῶν ἀύλων εἰδῶν
ἐν τῷ τῆς οὐσίας λόγῳ, ἄνωθεν δὲ αὐτῇ παρὰ τοῦ νοῦ ἐντυποῦσθαι τὰ ἀπόρρητα γράμματα, ἀλλ' ὡς ἔχουσα ἀσαφῶς τε καὶ ἀμαθῶς διὰ
τῆς νοερᾶς ἐπιβολῆς καὶ ἐλλάμψεως καθαρῶς προσβάλλει καὶ διαυγῶς. ἀλλ' οὐδὲ ὅπερ φὴς ὁ παντέλειος αὐτῇ νοῦς ἀρκεῖ πρὸς τὴν
ἀποπλήρωσιν τῶν θειοτέρων εἰδῶν· ἐκεῖνος γὰρ ἀμέθεκτος παντάπασι καὶ ἥτις ἑτέρα κρείττων οὐσία, ὁ δὲ ἐν ψυχῇ νοῦς ὑφειμένος
ἐκείνου καὶ μετεχόμενος, προεστηκὼς μὲν τῆς ψυχικῆς οὐσίας καὶ καταλάμπων αὐτήν. Μὴ τοίνυν τούτων οὕτω διωρισμένων ταὐτὸν
νοῦν καὶ ψυχὴν ὑπολάμβανε. ὁ μὲν γὰρ ἀκίνητος, ἡ δὲ αὐτοκίνητος, καὶ ὁ μὲν αἰώνιος καὶ τὴν οὐσίαν καὶ τὴν ἐνέργειαν, ἡ δὲ
τῇ μὲν οὐσίᾳ ἕστηκε, μεταβάλλει δὲ ταῖς ἐνεργείαις, καὶ ὁ μὲν ἀεὶ τοῖς κρείττοσι πρόσεστι γένεσιν, ἡ δὲ κατὰ τὴν διπλῆν ἑαυτῆς
δύναμιν ἐφ' ἑκάτερα βλέπει καὶ νῦν μὲν τῷ κρείττονι μέρει, νῦν δὲ θατέρῳ κατάγεται, καὶ ὁ μὲν μὴ κινηθεὶς ἔχει τὸ νοούμενον,
ἡ δὲ οὐδὲν ἂν τῶν ὄντων συμπερανεῖ μὴ κινηθεῖσα διὰ προτάσεων. ἵνα δὲ
