from the circumference radiate towards the centre of a circle. This central principle is essentially single. If it was divisible, and if sense-impressions were directed towards two points at a distance from each other, such as the extremities of the same line, they would either still converge towards one and the same point, as, for instance, the middle (of the line), or one part would feel one thing, and another something else. It would be absolutely as if I felt one thing, and you felt another, when placed in the presence of one and the same thing (as thought Aristotle, de Anima[53]). Facts, therefore, demonstrate that sensations centre in one and the same principle; as visible images are centred in the pupil of the eye; otherwise how could we, through the pupil, see the greatest objects? So much the more, therefore, must the sensations that centre in the (Stoic) "directing principle"[54] resemble indivisible intuitions and be perceived by an indivisible principle. If the latter possessed extension, it could, like the sense-object, be divided; each of its parts would thus perceive one of the parts of the sense-object, and nothing within us would grasp the object in its totality. The subject that perceives must then be entirely one; otherwise, how could it be divided? In that case it could not be made to coincide with the sense-object, as two equal figures superimposed on each other, because the directing principle does not have an extension equal to that of the sense-object. How then will we carry out the division? Must the subject that feels contain as many parts as there are in the sense-object? Will each part of the soul, in its turn, feel by its own parts, or will (we decide that) the parts of parts will not feel? Neither is that likely. If, on the other hand, each part feels the entire object, and if each magnitude is divisible to infinity, the result is that, for a single object, there will be an infinity of sensations in each part of the soul; and, so much the more, an infinity of images in the principle that directs us. (This, however, is the opposite of the actual state of affairs.)
AGAINST THE STOICS, SENSATIONS ARE NOT IMPRESSIONS OF A SEAL ON WAX.
Besides, if the principle that feels were corporeal, it could feel only so long as exterior objects produced in the blood or in the air some impression similar to that of a seal on wax.[55] If they impressed their images on wet substances, as is no doubt supposed, these impressions would become confused as images in water, and memory would not occur. If, however, these impressions persisted, they would either form an obstacle to subsequent ones, and no further sensation would occur; or they would be effaced by the new ones, which would destroy memory. If then the soul is capable of recalling earlier sensations, and having new ones, to which the former would form no obstacle, it is because she is not corporeal.
SENSATION CANNOT BE RELAYED FROM SENSE-ORGAN TO DIRECTING PRINCIPLE.
7. The same reflections may be made about pain, and one's feeling of it. When a man's finger is said to give him pain, this, no doubt, is a recognition that the seat of the pain is in the finger, and that the feeling of pain is experienced by the directing principle.
Consequently, when a part of the spirit suffers, this suffering is felt by the directing principle, and shared by the whole soul.[56] How can this sympathy be explained? By relay transmission, (the Stoic) will answer; the sense-impression is felt first by the animal spirit that is in the finger, and then transmitted to the neighboring part, and so on till it reaches the directing part. Necessarily, if the pain is felt by the first part that experiences it, it will also be felt by the second part to which it is transmitted; then by the third, and so on, until the one pain would have caused an infinite number of sensations.
Last the directing principle will perceive all these sensations, adding thereto its own sensation. Speaking strictly, however, each of these sensations will not transmit the suffering of the finger, but the suffering of one of the intermediate parts. For instance, the second sensation will relay the suffering of the hand. The third, that of the arm, and so on, until there will be an infinity of sensations.
The directing principle, for its part, will not feel the pain of the finger, but its own; it will know none but that, it will pay no attention to the rest, because it will ignore the pain suffered by the finger. Therefore, relayed sensation is an impossibility, nor could one part of the body perceive the suffering felt by another part; for the body has extension, and, in every extension, parts are foreign to each other (the opposite of the opinion of Cleanthes, Nemesius).[57] Consequently, the principle that feels must everywhere be identical with itself; and among all beings, the body is that which is least suitable to this identity.
THE BODY CANNOT THINK.
8. If, in any sense whatever, the soul were a body, we could not think.
Here is the proof. If feeling[58] is explained as the soul's laying hold of perceptible things by making use of the body, thinking cannot also of making use of the body. Otherwise, thinking and feeling would be identical. Thus, thinking must consist in perceiving without the help of the body (as thought Aristotle[59]). So much the more, the thinking principle cannot be corporeal. Since it is sensation that grasps sense-objects, it must likewise be thought, or intellection, that grasps intelligible objects. Though this should be denied, it will be admitted that we think certain intelligibles entities, and that we perceive entities that have no extension. How could an entity that had extension think one that had no extension? Or a divisible entity, think an indivisible one? Could this take place by an indivisible part?
In this case, the thinking subject will not be corporeal; for there is no need that the whole subject be in contact with the object; it would suffice if one of its parts reached the object (as Aristotle said against Plato).[60] If then this truth be granted, that the highest thoughts must have incorporeal objects, the latter can be cognized only by a thinking principle that either is, or becomes independent of body.
Even the objection that the object of thought is constituted by the forms inherent in matter, implies that these forces cannot be thought unless, by intelligence, they are separated from matter. It is not by means of the carnal mass of the body, nor generally by matter, that we can effect the abstraction of triangle, circle, line or point. To succeed in this abstraction, the soul must separate from the body, and consequently, the soul cannot be corporeal.
THE BODY CANNOT POSSESS VIRTUE.
Neither do beauty or justice possess extension, I suppose; and their conception must be similar. These things can be cognized or retained only by the indivisible part of the soul. If the latter were corporeal, where indeed could virtues, prudence, justice and courage exist? In this case, virtues (as Critias thought),[61] would be no more than a certain disposition of the spirit, or blood (as Empedocles also thought).[62] For instance, courage and temperance would respectively be no more than a certain irritability, and a fortunate temperament of the spirit; beauty would consist in the agreeable shape of outlines, which cause persons, in whom they occur, to be called elegant and handsome. Under this hypothesis, indeed, the types of spirit might possess vigor and beauty. But what need would it have of temperance?
On the contrary, the spirit would seek to be agreeably affected by the things it touches and embraces, to enjoy a moderate heat, a gentle coolness, and to be in contact only with sweet, tender, and smooth entities. What incentive would the spirit have to apportion rewards to those who had deserved them?
IF VIRTUE WERE CORPOREAL IT WOULD BE PERISHABLE.
Are the notions of virtue, and other intelligible entities by the soul thought eternal, or does virtue arise and perish? If so, by what being, and how will it be formed? It is the same problem that remains to be solved. Intelligible entities must therefore be eternal and immutable, like geometrical notions, and consequently cannot be corporeal.
Further, the subject in whom they exist must be of a nature similar to theirs, and therefore not be corporeal; for the nature of body is not to remain immutable, but to be in a perpetual flow.
BODIES ARE ACTIVE ONLY BY MEANS OF INCORPOREAL POWERS.
(9.) There are men who locate the soul in the body, so as to give her a foundation in some sphere of activity, to account for the various phenomena in the body, such as getting hot or cold, pushing on or stopping, (and the like). They evidently do not realize that bodies produce these effects only through incorporeal powers, and that those are not the powers that we attribute to the soul, which are thought, sensation, reasoning, desire, judiciousness, propriety and wisdom, all of them entities that cannot possible be attributes of a corporeal entity. Consequently, those (materialists) attribute to the body all the faculties of incorporeal essences, and leave nothing for the latter.
WHY BODIES ARE ACTIVATED BY INCORPOREAL POWERS.
The proof that bodies are activated only by incorporeal faculties may be proved as follows: Quantity and quality are two different things.
Every body has a quantity, but not always a quality, as in the case of matter, (according to the Stoic definition, that it was a body without quality, but possessing magnitude[63]). Granting this, (you Stoic) will also be forced to admit that as quality is something different from quantity, it must consequently be different from the body. Since then every body has a quantity, how could quality, which is no quantity, be a body? Besides, as we said above,[64] every body and mass is altered by division; nevertheless, when a body is cut into pieces, every part preserves the entire quality without undergoing alteration. For instance, every molecule of honey, possesses the quality of sweetness as much as all the molecules taken together; consequently that sweetness cannot be corporeal; and other qualities must be in a similar case. Moreover, if the active powers were corporeal, they would have to have a material mass proportional to their strength or weakness. Now there are great masses that have little force, and small ones that have great force; demonstrating that power does not depend on extension, and should be attributed to some (substance) without extension. Finally, you may say that matter is identical with body, and produces different beings only by receiving different qualities (the Stoics considering that even the divinity was no more than modified matter, their two principles being matter and quality;[65] the latter, however, was also considered as body). How do you (Stoics) not see that qualities thus added to matter are reasons, that are primary and immaterial? Do not object that when the spirit (breath) and blood abandon animals, they cease to live; for if these things are necessary to life, there are for our life many other necessities, even during the presence of the soul (as thought Nemesius).[66] Besides, neither spirit nor blood are distributed to every part of the body.
THE SOUL CAN PENETRATE THE BODY; BUT TWO BODIES CANNOT PENETRATE EACH OTHER.
(10). The soul penetrates the whole body, while an entire body cannot penetrate another entire body. Further, if the soul is corporeal, and pervades the whole body, she will, with the body, form (as Alexander of Aphrodisia pointed out) a mixture,[67] similar to the other bodies (that are constituted by a mixture of matter and quality, as the Stoics taught). Now as none of the bodies that enter into a mixture is in actualization[68] the soul, instead of being in actualization in the bodies, would be in them only potentially; consequently, she would cease to be a soul, as the sweet ceases to be sweet when mingled with the bitter; we would, therefore, have no soul left. If, when one body forms a mixture with another body, total penetration occurs, so that each molecule contains equal parts of two bodies and that each body be distributed equally in the whole space occupied by the mass of the other, without any increase of volume, nothing that is not divided will remain. Indeed, mixture operates not only between the larger parts (which would be no more than a simple juxtaposition); but the two bodies must penetrate each other mutually, even if smaller--it would indeed be impossible for the smaller to equal the greater; still, when the smaller penetrates the larger it must divide it entirely. If the mixture operates in this manner in every part, and if no undivided part of the mass remain, the body must be divided into points, which is impossible. Indeed, were this division pushed to infinity, since every body is fully divisible, bodies will have to be infinite not only potentially, but also in actuality. It is therefore impossible for one entire body to penetrate another in its entirety. Now as the soul penetrates the entire body, the soul must be incorporeal (as thought Nemesius).[69] THE STOIC DEVELOPMENT FROM HABIT TO SOUL AND INTELLIGENCE WOULD MAKE THE PERFECT ARISE FROM THE IMPERFECT, AN IMPOSSIBILITY.
(11). (If, as Stoics claim, man first was a certain nature called habit,[70] then a soul, and last an intelligence, the perfect would have arisen from the imperfect, which is impossible). To say that the first nature of the soul is to be a spirit, and that this spirit became soul only after having been exposed to cold, and as it were became soaked by its contact, because the cold subtilized it;[71] this is an absurd hypothesis. Many animals are born in warm places, and do not have their soul exposed to action of cold. Under this hypothesis, the primary nature of the soul would have been made dependent on the concourse of exterior circumstances. The Stoics, therefore, posit as principle that which is less perfect (the soul), and trace it to a still less perfect earlier thing called habit (or form of inorganic things).[72] Intelligence, therefore, is posited in the last rank since it is alleged to be born of the soul, while, on the contrary, the first rank should be assigned to intelligence, the second to the soul, the third to nature, and, following natural order, consider that which is less perfect as the posterior element. In this system the divinity, by the mere fact of his possessing intelligence, is posterior and begotten, possessing only an incidental intelligence.
The result would, therefore, be that there was neither soul, nor intelligence, nor divinity; for never can that which is potential pass to the condition of actualization, without the prior existence of some actualized principle. If what is potential were to transform itself into actualization--which is absurd--its passage into actualization will have to involve at the very least a contemplation of something which is not merely potential, but actualized. Nevertheless, on the hypothesis that what is potential can permanently remain identical, it will of itself pass into actualization, and will be superior to the being which is potential only because it will be the object of the aspiration of such a being. We must, therefore, assign the first rank to the being that has a perfect and incorporeal nature, which is always in actualization. Thus intelligence and soul are prior to nature; the soul, therefore, is not a spirit, and consequently no body. Other reasons for the incorporeality of the soul have been advanced; but the above suffices (as thought Aristotle).[73] II. THE SOUL IS NEITHER THE HARMONY NOR ENTELECHY OF THE BODY--THE SOUL IS THE HARMONY OF THE BODY; AGAINST THE PYTHAGOREANS.
(12). a. Since the soul is not corporeal, its real nature must be ascertained. Shall we assert that she is something distinct from the body, but dependent thereon, as, for instance, a harmony? Pythagoras, indeed, used this word in a technical sense; and after him the harmony of the body has been thought to be something similar to the harmony of a lyre. As tension produces in the lyre-strings an affection (or, manner of being, or state) that is called harmony, likewise, as contrary elements are mingled in our body, an individual mixture produces life and soul, which, therefore, is only an individual affection of this mixture.
WHY THE SOUL IS NOT A HARMONY.
As has already been said above[74] this hypothesis is inadmissible for several reasons. To begin with, the soul is prior (to the body), and the harmony is posterior thereto. Then the soul dominates the body, governs it, and often even resists it, which would be impossible if the soul were only a harmony. The soul, indeed, is a "being," which harmony is not. When the corporeal principles of which we are composed are mingled in just proportions, their temperament constitutes health (but not a "being," such as the soul). Besides, every part of the body being mingled in a different manner should form (a different harmony, and consequently) a different soul, so that there would be several of them. The decisive argument, however, is that this soul (that constitutes a harmony) presupposes another soul which would produce this harmony, as a lyre needs a musician who would produce harmonic vibrations in the strings, because he possesses within himself the reason according to which he produces the harmony. The strings of the lyre do not vibrate of themselves, and the elements of our body cannot harmonize themselves. Nevertheless, under this hypothesis, animated and orderly "being" would have been made up out of inanimate and disordered entities; and these orderly "beings" would owe their order and existence to chance. That is as impossible for parts as for the whole.
The soul, therefore, is no harmony.
THE SOUL IS NOT THE ENTELECHY OF THE BODY (POLEMIC AGAINST ARISTOTLE).
ARISTOTLE'S STATEMENT OF THE PROBLEM.[75] (13). b. Now let us examine the opinion of those who call the soul an entelechy. They say that, in the composite, the soul plays the part of form in respect to matter, in the body the soul animates. The soul, however, is not said to be the form of any body, nor of the body as such; but of the natural body, that is organized, and which possesses life potentially.[76] IF THE SOUL IS AN ENTELECHY, SHE IS A DIFFERENT ONE THAN ARISTOTLE'S.
If the soul's relation to the body is the same as that of the statue to the metal, the soul will be divided with the body, and on cutting a member a portion of the soul would be cut along with it. According to this teaching, the soul separates from the body only during sleep, since she must inhere in the body of which she is the entelechy, in which case sleep would become entirely inexplicable. If the soul be an entelechy, the struggle of reason against the passions would become entirely impossible. The entire human being will experience but one single sentiment, and never be in disagreement with itself. If the soul be an entelechy, there will perhaps still be sensations, but mere sensations; pure thoughts will have become impossible. Consequently the Peripateticians themselves are obliged to introduce (into human nature) another soul, namely, the pure intelligence, which they consider immortal.[77] The rational soul, therefore, would have to be an entelechy in a manner different from their definition thereof, if indeed this name is at all to be used.
IF AN ENTELECHY BE GRANTED, IT IS INSEPARABLE FROM THE BODY.
The sense-soul, which preserves the forms of sense-objects previously perceived, must preserve them without the body. Otherwise, these forms would inhere in the body like figures and corporeal shapes. Now, if the forms inhered in the sense-soul in this manner, they could not be received therein otherwise (than as corporeal impressions). That is why, if we do grant the existence of an entelechy, it must be inseparable from the body. Even the faculty of appetite, not indeed that which makes us feel the need of eating and drinking, but that which desires things that are independent of the body, could not either be an entelechy.[78] NEITHER COULD THE SOUL OF GROWTH BE AN ENTELECHY.
The soul's faculty of growth remains to be considered. This at least might be thought an inseparable entelechy. But neither does that suit her nature. For if the principle of every plant is in its root, and if growth takes place around and beneath it,[79] as occurs in many plants, it is evident that the soul's faculty of growth, abandoning all the other parts, has concentrated in the root alone; it, therefore, was not distributed all around the soul, like an inseparable entelechy. Add that this soul, before the plant grows, is already contained in the small body (of the seed). If then, after having vivified a great plant, the soul's faculty of growth can condense into a small space, and if later it can, from this small space, again spread over a whole plant, it is evidently entirely separable from the (plant's) matter.
THE ENTELECHY IS NOT A FORM OF THE BODY, AS THE SOUL TRANSMIGRATES.
Besides, as the soul is indivisible, the entelechy of the divisible body could not become divisible as is the body. Besides, the same soul passes from the body of one animal into the body of some other. How could the soul of the first become that of the second, if she were only the entelechy of a single one? The example of animals that metamorphose demonstrates the impossibility of this theory. The soul, therefore, is not the simple form of a body; she is a genuine "being," which does not owe its existence merely to her being founded on the body, but which, on the contrary, exists before having become the soul of some individual animal. It is, therefore, not the body that begets the soul.
THE SOUL IS AN INCORPOREAL AND IMMORTAL ESSENCE. THE SOUL BEING NONE OF CORPOREAL POSSIBILITIES, MUST BE INCORPOREAL.
c. What then can be the nature of the soul, if she is neither a body, nor a corporeal affection, while, nevertheless, all the active force, the productive power and the other faculties reside in her, or come from her? What sort of a "being," indeed, is this (soul) that has an existence independent of the body? She must evidently be a veritable "being." Indeed, everything corporeal must be classified as generated, and excluded from genuine "being," because it is born, and perishes, never really exists, and owes its salvation exclusively to participation in the genuine existence, and that only in the measure of its participation therein.
THE PERSISTENCE OF THE CHANGEABLE IMPLIES THE ETERNAL IN THE BACKGROUND.[80] 9. (14). It is absolutely necessary to postulate the existence of a nature different from bodies, by itself fully possessing genuine existence, which can neither be born nor perish. Otherwise, all other things would hopelessly disappear, as a result of the destruction of the existence which preserves both the individuals and the universe, as their beauty and salvation. The soul, indeed, is the principle of movement (as Plato thought, in the Phaedrus); it is the soul that imparts movement to everything else; the soul moves herself. She imparts life to the body she animates; but alone she possesses life, without ever being subject to losing it, because she possesses it by herself. All beings, indeed, live only by a borrowed life; otherwise, we would have to proceed from cause to cause unto infinity. There must, therefore, exist a nature that is primarily alive, necessarily incorruptible and immortal because it is the principle of life for everything else. It is thereon that must be founded all that is divine and blessed, that lives and exists by itself, that lives and exists supremely, which is immutable in its essence, and which can neither be born nor perish. How indeed could existence be born or perish? If the name of "existence" really suited it, it must exist forever, just as whiteness is not alternately black and white. If whiteness were existence itself, it would, with its "being" (or nature) (which is, to be whiteness), possess an eternal existence; but, in reality, it is no more than whiteness. Therefore, the principle that possesses existence in itself and in a supreme degree will always exist. Now this primary and eternal existence can not be anything dead like a stone, or a piece of wood. It must live, and live with a pure life, as long as it exists within itself. If something of it mingles with what is inferior, this part meets obstacles in its aspiration to the good; but it does not lose its nature, and resumes its former condition on returning to a suitable condition (as thought Plato, in his Phaedo[81]).
THE SOUL IS INCORPOREAL BECAUSE OF HER KINSHIP WITH THE DIVINE.
10. (15). The soul has affinities with the divine and eternal nature.
This is evident, because, as we have demonstrated it, she is not a body, has neither figure nor color, and is impalpable. Consider the following demonstration. It is generally granted that everything that is divine and that possesses genuine existence enjoys a happy and wise life. Now let us consider the nature of our soul, in connection with that of the divine. Let us take a soul, not one inside of a body, which is undergoing the irrational motions of appetite and anger, and the other affections born of the body, but a soul that has eliminated all that, and which, so far as possible, had no intercourse with the body.
Such a soul would show us that vices are something foreign to the nature of the soul, and come to her from elsewhere, and that, inasmuch as she is purified, she in her own right possesses the most eminent qualities, wisdom, and the other virtues (as thought Plato[82]). If the soul, when re-entering into herself, is such, how could she not participate in this nature that we have acknowledged to be suitable to every thing that is eternal and divine? As wisdom and real virtue are divine things, they could not dwell in a vile and mortal entity; the existence that receives them is necessarily divine, since it participates in divine things by their mutual affinity and community.
Anyone who thus possesses wisdom and virtue in his soul differs little from the superior beings; he is inferior to them only by the fact of his having a body. If all men, or at least, if many of them held their soul in this disposition, no one would be sceptic enough to refuse to believe that the soul is immortal. But as we consider the soul in her present condition of being soiled by vices, no one imagines that her nature is divine and immortal.
THE SOUL, LIKE OTHER THINGS, SHOULD BE JUDGED IN HER PUREST CONDITION.
Now when we consider the nature of some being, it should be studied in its rarest condition, since extraneous additions hinder it from being rightly judged. The soul must be therefore considered only after abstraction of foreign things, or rather, he who makes this abstraction should observe himself in that condition. He then will not doubt that he is immortal, when he sees himself in the pure world of intelligence.
He will see his intelligence occupied, not in the observation of some sense-object that is mortal, but in thinking the eternal by an equally eternal faculty.[83] He will see all the entities in the intelligible world, and he will see himself become intelligible, radiant, and illuminated by the truth emanating from the Good, which sheds the light of truth on all intelligible entities.[84] Then (like Empedocles, in Diog. Laertes[85]), he will have the right to say: "Farewell, I am now an immortal divinity."
For he has ascended to the divinity, and has become assimilated thereto. As purification permits one to know the better things, so the notions we have within us, and which constitute real science, are made clear. Indeed, it is not by an excursion among external objects that the soul attains the intuition of wisdom and virtue, but by re-entering into herself, in thinking herself in her primitive condition. Then she clears up and recognizes in herself the divine statues, soiled by the rust of time. Likewise, if a piece of gold were animated and released itself from the earth by which it was covered, after first having been ignorant of its real nature because it did not see its own splendor, it would admire itself when considering itself in its purity; it would find that it had no need of a borrowed beauty, and would consider itself happy to remain isolated from everything else.[86] EVEN ON THE STOIC HYPOTHESIS THE SOUL MUST BE IMMORTAL.
11. (16). What sensible man, after having thus considered the nature of the soul, could still doubt of the immortality of a principle which derives life from naught but itself, and which cannot lose it? How could the soul lose life, since she did not borrow it from elsewhere, and since she does not possess it as fire possesses heat? For, without being an accident of fire, the heat, nevertheless, is an accident of its matter; for fire can perish. But, in the soul, life is not an accident that comes to add itself to a material subject to constitute a soul. In fact, there is here an alternative: either life is a genuine "being," which is alive by itself; in which case this "being" is the soul that we are seeking to discover, and immortality cannot be refused her; or the soul is a composite, and she must be decomposed until we arrive at something immortal which moves by itself; and such a principle could not be subject to death. Further, when (Stoics) say that life is only an accidental modification of matter, they are thereby forced to acknowledge that the principle that imparted this modification to matter is immortal, and incapable of admitting anything contrary to what it communicates (that is, life, as said Plato, in his Phaedo[87]), but there is only a single nature that possesses life in actualization.
THERE IS NO CONCEIVABLE WAY IN WHICH SOUL COULD PERISH.
12. (17). (The Stoics), indeed, claim that every soul is perishable.
In this case, everything should long since have been destroyed. Others might say that our soul were mortal, while the universal Soul were immortal. On them, however, is the burden of proof of a difference between the individual and universal souls. Both of them, indeed, are a principle of movement; both live by themselves; both grasp the same object by the same faculty, either by thinking the things contained in heaven, or by considering the nature ("being") of each being, ascending unto the first principle. Since our soul thinks absolute essences either by the notions she finds within herself, or by reminiscence, she evidently is prior to the body. Possessing knowledge of eternal entities, she herself must be eternal. All that dissolves, existing only by its compositeness, can naturally dissolve in the same manner that it became composite. But the soul is a single, simple actualization, whose essence is life; not in this manner therefore can the soul perish. Neither could the soul perish by division into a number of parts; for, as we have shown, the soul is neither a mass nor a quantity. As little could the soul perish by alteration; for when alteration destroys anything, it may remove its form, but leaves its matter; alteration, therefore, is a characteristic of something composite. Consequently as the soul cannot perish in any of these ways, she is imperishable.
DESCENT INTO THE BODY NEED NOT CONFLICT WITH THE ETERNITY OF SOUL.
13. (18). If intelligible entities are separated from sense objects, how does it happen that the soul descends into a body?[88] So long as the soul is a pure and impassible intelligence, so long as she enjoys a purely intellectual life like the other intelligible beings, she dwells among them; for she has neither appetite nor desire. But that part which is inferior to intelligence and which is capable of desires, follows their impulsion, "proceeds" and withdraws from the intelligible world. Wishing to ornament matter on the model of the Ideas she contemplated in Intelligence, in haste to exhibit her fruitfulness, and to manifest the germs she bears within her (as said Plato, in the Banquet[89]), the soul applies herself to produce and create, and, as result of this application, she is, as it were, orientated (or, in "tension") towards sense-objects. With the universal Soul, the human soul shares the administration of the whole world, without, however, entering it; then, desiring to administer some portion of the world on her own responsibility, she separates from the universal Soul, and passes into a body. But even when she is present with the body, the soul does not devote herself entirely to it, as some part of her always remains outside of it; that is how her intelligence remains impassible.[90] THE SOUL AS THE ARTIST OF THE UNIVERSE.
The soul is present in the body at some times, and at other times, is outside of it. When, indeed, following her own inclination, she descends from first-rank entities (that is, intelligible entities) to third-rank entities (that is, earthly entities), she "proceeds" by virtue of the actualization of intelligence, which, remaining within herself, embellishes everything by the ministration of the soul, and which, itself being immortal, ordains everything with immortal power; for intelligence exists continuously by a continuous actualization.[91] ALL SOULS HAVE IMMORTALITY, EVEN IF SUNK INTO ANIMALS OR PLANTS.
14. (19). What about the souls of animals inferior to man? The (rational) souls that have strayed so far as to descend into the bodies of animals are nevertheless still immortal.[92] Souls of a kind other (than rational souls), cannot proceed from anything else than the living nature (of the universal Soul); and they necessarily are the principles of life for all animals. The case is the same with the souls that inhere in plants. Indeed, all souls have issued from the same principle (the universal Soul), all have an individual life, and are indivisible and incorporeal essences ("beings").
EVEN IF THE SOUL HAS DIFFERENT PARTS, THE ORIGINAL PARTS SURVIVE.
To the objection that the human soul must decompose because she contains three parts, it may be answered that, when souls issue from here below, those that are purified leave what had been added to them in generation (the irrational soul,[93]) while the other non-purified souls do free themselves therefrom with time. Besides, this lower part of the soul does not itself perish, for it exists as long as the principle from which it proceeds. Indeed, nothing that exists is annihilated.
THE HISTORIC EVIDENCE FOR IMMORTALITY OF THE SOUL.
15. (20). This, then, is our answer to those who seek a philosophical demonstration. Those who are satisfied with the testimony of faith and sense, may be referred to those extracts from history which furnish numerous proofs thereof.[94] We may also refer to the oracles given by the divinities who order an appeasement of the souls who were victims of some injustice, and to honor the dead,[95] and to the rites observed