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object:ENNEAD 05.09 - Of Intelligence, Ideas and Essence.
book class:Plotinus - Complete Works Vol 01
author class:Plotinus
subject class:Philosophy
subject class:Christianity
class:chapter


THE SENSUAL MAN, THE MORAL, AND THE SPIRITUAL.

1. From their birth, men exercise their senses, earlier than their intelligence,106 and they are by necessity forced to direct their attention to sense-objects. Some stop there, and spend their life without progressing further. They consider suffering as evil, and pleasure as the good, judging it to be their business to avoid the one and encompass the other. That is the content of wisdom for those of them that pride themselves on being reasonable; like those heavy birds who, having weighted themselves down by picking up too much from the earth, cannot take flight, though by nature provided with wings. There are others who have raised themselves a little above earthly objects because their soul, endowed with a better nature, withdraws from pleasures to seek something higher;107 but as they are not capable of arriving at contemplation of the intelligible, and as, after having left our lower region here, they do not know where to lodge, they return to a conception of morality which considers virtue to consist in these common-place actions and occupations whose narrow sphere they had at first attempted to leave behind. Finally a third kind is that of those divine men who are endowed with a piercing vision, and whose penetrating glance contemplates the splendor of the intelligible world, and rise unto it,103 taking their flight above the clouds and darkness of this world. Then, full of scorn for terrestrial things, they remain up there, and reside in their true fatherland with the unspeakable bliss of the man who, after long journeys, is at last repatriated.
THE HIGHER REGION REACHED ONLY BY THOSE WHO ARE BORN PHILOSOPHERS.

2. Which is this higher region? What must be done to reach it? One must be naturally disposed to love, and be really a born philosopher.108 In the presence of beauty, the lover feels something similar to the pains of childbirth; but far from halting at bodily beauty, he rises to that aroused in the soul by virtue, duties, science and laws. Then he follows them up to the cause of their beauty, and in this ascending progress stops only when he has reached the Principle that occupies the first rank, that which is beautiful in itself.109 Then only does he cease being driven by this torment that we compare to the pains of childbirth.
LOVE IS TRANSFORMED INTO PROGRESSIVELY HIGHER STAGES.

But how does he rise up thither? How does he have the power to do so? How does he learn to love? Here it is. The beauty seen in bodies is incidental; it consists in the shapes of which the bodies are the matter.110 Consequently the substance changes, and it is seen changing from beauty to ugliness. The body has only a borrowed beauty. Who imparted that beauty to the body? On the one hand, the presence of beauty; on the other, the actualization of the soul which fashioned the body, and which gave it the shape it possesses. But is the soul, by herself, absolute beauty? No, since some souls are wise and beautiful, while some others are foolish and ugly. It is therefore only by wisdom that the soul is beautiful. But from104 what is her wisdom derived? Necessarily from intelligence; not from the intelligence that is intelligent at some time, though not at others, but from the genuine Intelligence, which is beautiful on that very account.111 Shall we stop at Intelligence, as a first principle? Or shall we on the contrary still rise above it? Surely so, for Intelligence presents itself to us before the first Principle only because it is, so to speak, located in the antechamber of the Good.112 It bears all things within itself, and manifests them, so that it displays the image of the Good in manifoldness, while the Good itself remains in an absolute simple unity.
PROOFS FOR THE EXISTENCE AND NATURE OF INTELLIGENCE.

3. Let us now consider the Intelligence which reason tells us is absolute essence and genuine "being," and whose existence we have already established in a different manner. It would seem ridiculous to inquire whether Intelligence form part of the scale of beings; but there are men who doubt it, or who at least are disposed to ask for a demonstration that Intelligence possesses the nature we predicate of it, that it is separated (from matter), that it is identical with the essences, and that it contains the ideas. This is our task.
IN THE HUMAN WORLD EVERYTHING IS A COMPOSITE OF FORM AND MATTER.

All things that we consider to be essences are composites; nothing is simple or single, either in works of art, or in the products of nature.113 Works of art, indeed, contain metal, wood, stone, and are derived from these substances only by the labor of the artist, who, by giving matter its form makes of it a statue, or bed, or house. Among the products of nature, those that105 are compounds or mixtures may be analyzed into the form impressed on the elements of the compound; so, for instance, we may in a man, distinguish a soul and body, and in the body four elements. Since the very matter of the elements, taken in itself, has no form, every object seems composed of matter and of some principle that supplies it with form.114 So we are led to ask whence matter derives its form, and to seek whether the soul is simple, or whether it contains two parts, one of which plays the parts of matter, and the other of form,115 so that the first part would be similar to the form received by the metal of a statue, and the latter to the principle which produces the form itself.
THE WORLD-SOUL ALSO IS A COMPOUND OF FORM AND MATTER.

Applying this conception to the universe, we rise to Intelligence, recognizing therein the demiurgic creator of the world. It was in receiving from it its shapes by the intermediation of another principle, the universal Soul, that the (material) substances became water, air, earth and fire. On the one hand, the Soul shapes the four elements of the world;116 on the other, she receives from Intelligence the (seminal) reasons,117 as the souls of the artists themselves receive from the arts the reasons which they work out.118 In Intelligence, therefore, there is a part which is the form of the soul; it is intelligence considered, as shape. There is another which imparts shape, like the sculptor who gives the metal the shape of the statue, and which in itself possesses all it gives.119 Now the (shapes) which the Intelligence imparts to the soul connect with the truth as closely as possible, while those which the soul imparts to the body are only images and appearances.120

106
WHY OUR ASCENT CANNOT STOP WITH THE SOUL.

4. Why should we not, on arriving at the Soul, stop there, and consider her the first principle? Because Intelligence is a power different from the Soul, and better than the Soul; and what is better must, by its very nature, precede (the worst). The Stoics121 are wrong in thinking that it is the Soul which, on reaching her perfection, begets Intelligence. How could that which is potential pass into actualization unless there were some principle that effected that transition? If this transition were due to chance, it could not have occurred at all. The first rank must therefore be assigned to that which is in actualization, which needs nothing, which is perfect, while imperfect things must be assigned to the second rank. These may be perfected by the principles that begat them, which, in respect to them, play a paternal part, perfecting what they had originally produced that was imperfect. What is thus produced is matter, as regards the creating principle, and then becomes perfect, on receiving its form from it. Besides, the Soul is (often) affected; and we need to discover some thing that is impassible, without which everything is dissolved by time; therefore there is need of some principle prior to the soul. Further, the Soul is in the world; now there must be something that resides outside of the world, and which consequently would be superior to the Soul; for since that which inheres in the world resides within the body, or matter, if nothing existed outside of the world, nothing would remain permanent. In this case, the (seminal) reason of man, and all the other reasons could be neither permanent nor eternal. The result of all these considerations, as well as of many others that we could add thereto, is the necessary assertion of the existence of Intelligence beyond the Soul.

107
INTELLIGENCE IS IN ACTUALIZATION BECAUSE ITS THOUGHT IS IDENTICAL WITH ITS ESSENCE OR EXISTENCE.

5. Taking it in its genuine sense, Intelligence is not only potential, arriving at being intelligent after having been unintelligentfor otherwise, we would be forced to seek out some still higher principlebut is in actualization, and is eternal. As it is intelligent by itself, it is by itself that it thinks what it thinks, and that it possesses what is possesses. Now since it thinks of itself and by itself, it itself is what it thinks. If we could distinguish between its existence and its thought, its "being" would be unintelligent; it would be potential, not in actualization. Thought, therefore, must not be separated from its object, although, from sense-objects, we have become accustomed to conceive of intelligible entities as distinct from each other.
REASONS, AS ARCHETYPES, MUST HAVE EXISTED BEFORE STOIC "HABIT," NATURE OR SOUL.

Which then is the principle that acts, that thinks, and what is the actualization and thought of Intelligence, necessary to justify the assertion that it is what it thinks? Evidently Intelligence, by its mere real existence, thinks beings, and makes them exist; it therefore is the beings. Indeed, the beings will either exist outside of it, or within it; and in the latter case they would have to be identical with it. That they should exist outside of Intelligence, is unthinkable; for where would they be located? They must therefore exist within it, and be identical with it. They could not be in sense-objects, as common people think, because sense-objects could not be the first in any genus. The form which inheres in their matter is only the representation of existence; now a form which exists in anything other than itself is put in it by a superior principle, and is its image. Further, if Intelligence108 must be the creative power of the universe, it could not, while creating the universe, think beings as existent in what does not yet exist. Intelligible entities, therefore, must exist before the world, and cannot be images of sense-objects, being on the contrary, their archetypes, and constituting the "being" of Intelligence. It might be objected that the (seminal) reasons might suffice. These reasons are, no doubt, eternal; and, if they be eternal and impassible, they must exist within the Intelligence whose characteristics we have described, the Intelligence which precedes the "habit,"122 nature,123 and the soul,124 because here these entities are potential.125
INTELLIGENCE IS POSTULATED BY THE GENERAL NECESSITIES OF THE WORLD.

Intelligence, therefore, essentially constitutes all beings; and when Intelligence thinks them, they are not outside of Intelligence, and neither precede nor follow it. Intelligence is the first legislator, or rather, it is the very law of existence. Parmenides126 therefore was right in saying, "Thought is identical with existence." The knowledge of immaterial things is therefore identical with those things themselves. That is why I recognize myself as a being, and why I have reminiscences of intelligible entities. Indeed, none of those beings is outside of Intelligence, nor is contained in any location; all of them subsist in themselves as immutable and indestructible. That is why they really are beings. If they were born, or perished, they would possess existence only in an incidental manner, they would no longer be beings; it would be the existence they possessed which would be essence. It is only by participation that sense-things are what they are said to be; the nature that constitutes their substance derives its shape from elsewhere, as the metal receives its shape from the sculptor, and wood from the carpenter;109 while the image of art penetrates into the matter, the art itself remains in its identity, and within itself possesses the genuine existence of the statue or of the bed. That is how the bodies' general necessity of participating in images shows that they are different from the beings; for they change, while the entities are immutable, possess within themselves their own foundation, and have no need of existing in any location, since they have no extension, and since they subsist in an intellectual and absolute existence. Again,127 the existence of the bodies needs to be guarded128 by some other principle, while intelligence, which furnishes the existence for objects in themselves perishable, has need of nothing to make itself subsist.
INTELLIGENCE CONTAINS ALL BEINGS GENERATIVELY.

6. Thus Intelligence actually constitutes all beings; it contains them all, but not locally; it contains them as it possesses itself; it is identical with them. All entities are simultaneously contained within it, and in it remain distinct, as many kinds of knowledge may exist within the soul without their number causing any confusion; each of them appears when needed, without involving the others. If in the soul each thought be an actualization independent of other thoughts, so much the more must Intelligence be all things simultaneously, with this restriction, however, that each of them is a special power. Considered in its universality, Intelligence contains all entities as the genus contains all species, as the whole contains all parts. Even the seminal powers bear the impress of this universality. Each one, considered in its totality, is a centre which contains all the parts of the organism in an undivided condition; nevertheless in it the reason of the eyes differs from that of the hands, and this diversity is manifested by that of the organs begotten (therefrom).110129 Each of the powers of the seed, therefore, is the total unity of the seminal reason when this power is united to the others which are implied therein. What in the seed is corporeal contains matter, as, for instance, humidity; but the seminal reason is the entire form; it is identical with the generative power, a power which itself is the image of a superior power of the soul. This generative power contained in seeds is130 usually called "nature." Proceeding from the superior powers as light radiates from the fire, it tames and fashions matter, imparting thereto the seminal reason131 without pushing it, or moving it as by levers.
THERE ARE SCIENTIFIC NOTIONS THAT ARE POSTERIOR, BUT SOME THAT ARE PRIOR.

7. The scientific notions that the soul forms of sense-objects, by discursive reason, and which should rather be called opinions,132 are posterior to the objects (they deal with); and consequently, are no more than images of them. But true scientific notions received from intelligence by discursive reasons do not contain any sense-conceptions. So far as they are scientific notions, they are the very things of which they are the conceptions; they reveal the intimate union of intelligence and thought. Interior Intelligence, which consists of the primary (natures) possesses itself intimately, resides within itself since all eternity, and is an actualization. It does not direct its glances outside of itself, because it possesses everything within itself; it does not acquire, and does not reason to discover things that may not be present to them. Those are operations characteristic of the soul. Intelligence, remaining fixed within itself, is all things simultaneously. Nevertheless, it is not thought which makes each of them subsist; it is only because intelligence thought the divinity or movement, for instance, that the divinity or movement exists.133 When we say that111 thoughts are forms, we are mistaken if thereby we mean that the intelligible exists only because Intelligence thinks it. On the contrary, it is only because the intelligible exists, that Intelligence can think. Otherwise, how would Intelligence come to think the intelligible? It cannot meet the intelligible by chance, nor waste itself in fruitless efforts.
THOUGHT IS THE FORM, SHAPE THE ACTUALIZATION OF THE BEING.

8. Since the thought is something essentially one (?), the form, which is the object of thought, and the idea134, 134a are one and the same thing. Which is this thing? Intelligence and the intellectual "being," for no idea is foreign to intelligence; each form is intelligence, and the whole intelligence is all the forms; every particular form is a particular intelligence. Likewise science, taken in its totality, is all the notions it embraces; every notion is a part of the total science; it is not separated from the science locally, and exists potentially in the whole science.135 Intelligence resides within itself, and by possessing itself calmly, is the eternal fulness of all things. If we conceived it as being prior to essence, we would have to say that it was the action and thought of Intelligence which produced and begat all beings. But as, on the contrary, it is certain that essence is prior to Intelligence, we should, within the thinking principle, first conceive the beings, then actualization and thought, just as (the nature) of fire is joined by the actualization of the fire, so that beings have innate intelligence (?148) as their actualization. Now essence is an actualization; therefore essence and intelligence are but a single actualization, or rather both of them fuse.136 Consequently, they form but a single nature, as beings, the actualization of essence, and intelligence. In this case112 the thought is the form, and the shape is the actualization of the being. When, however, in thought we separate essence from Intelligence, we must conceive one of these principles as prior to the other. The Intelligence which operates this separation is indeed different from the essence from which it separates;137 but the Intelligence which is inseparable from essence and which does not separate thought from essence is itself essence and all things.
INTELLIGENCE CONTAINS THE UNIVERSAL ARCHETYPE.

9. What then are the things contained within the unity of Intelligence which we separate in thinking of them? They must be expressed without disturbing their rest, and we must contemplate the contents of Intelligence by a science that somehow remains within unity. Since this sense-world is an animal which embraces all animals, since it derives both its general and special existence from a principle different from itself,138 a principle which, in turn, is derived from intelligence, therefore intelligence must itself contain the universal archetype, and must be that intelligible world of which Plato139 (well) says; "Intelligence sees the ideas contained within the existing animal."140 Since an animal, whose (seminal) reason exists with the matter fit to receive it, must of course be begotten, so the mere existence of a nature that is intellectual, all-powerful, and unhindered by any obstaclesince nothing can interpose between it and the (substance) capable of receiving the formmust necessarily be adorned (or, created) by intelligence, but only in a divided condition does it reveal the form it receives, so that, for instance, it shows us on one hand a man, and on the other the sun, while intelligence possesses everything in unity.

113
IN THE SENSE-WORLD ONLY THOSE THINGS THAT ARE FORMS PROCEED FROM INTELLIGENCE.

10. Therefore, in the sense-world, all the things that are forms proceed from intelligence; those which are not forms do not proceed therefrom. That is, in the intelligible world we do not find any of the things that are contrary to nature, any more than we find what is contrary to the arts in the arts themselves. Thus the seminal reason does not contain the defects, such as limping would be in a body. Congenital lameness is due to the reason's failure to dominate matter, while accidental lameness is due to deterioration of the form (idea?).
NATURAL CHARACTERISTICS ARE DERIVED FROM THE CATEGORIES IN THE INTELLIGIBLE.

The qualities that are natural, quantities, numbers, magnitudes, states, actions and natural experiences, movements and recuperations, either general or particular, are among the contents of the intelligible world, where time is replaced by eternity,141 and space is replaced by the "telescoping" of intelligible entities (that are within each other). As all entities are together in the intelligible world, whatever entity you select (by itself) is intellectual and living "being," identity and difference, movement and rest;142 it is what moves, and what is at rest; it is "being," and quality; that is, it is all. There every essence is in actualization, instead of merely being in potentiality; consequently it is not separated from quality.
THE INTELLIGIBLE WORLD FAILS TO CONTAIN EARTHLY IMPERFECTIONS.

Does the intelligible world contain only what is found in the sense-world, or does it contain anything additional?... Let us consider the arts, in this114 respect. To begin with, the intelligible world does not contain any imperfection. Evils here below come from lack, privation, omission; it is a state of matter, or of anything similar to matter, which failed to be completely assimilated.143
SOME ARTS ARE PURELY EARTHLY; OTHERS, LIKE MUSIC, INTELLIGIBLE.

11. Let us therefore consider the arts and their products. Unless as represented within human reason, we cannot refer to the intelligible world arts of imitation such as painting, sculpture, dancing, or acting, because they are born here below, take sense-objects as models, representing their forms, motions, and visible proportions.144 If, however, we possess a faculty which, by studying the beauties offered by the symmetry of animals, considers the general characteristics of this symmetry, it must form part of the intellectual power which, on high, contemplates universal symmetry. Music, however, which studies rhythm and harmony, is, so far as it studies what is intelligible in these things, the image of the music that deals with intelligible rhythm.
THERE ARE MANY AUXILIARY ARTS WHICH HELP THE PROGRESS OF NATURE.

The arts which produce sense-objects, such as architecture and carpentry, have their principles in the intelligible world, and participate in wisdom, so far as they make use of certain proportions. But as they apply these proportions to sense-objects, they cannot wholly be referred to the intelligible world, unless in so far as they are contained within human reason. The case is similar with agriculture, which assists the growth of plants; medicine, which increases health, and (gymnastics) which supplies the body with strength as well as vigor,145 for on high there is another Power, another115 Health, from which all living organisms derive their needed vigor.
OTHER ARTS ARE INTELLIGIBLE WHEN APPLIED TO THE INTELLIGIBLE.

Last, whenever rhetoric, strategy, private and public finance and politics weave beauty in their deeds, and they glance above, they (discover) that they have added to their science a contribution from the intelligible science.

The science of geometry, however, which deals (wholly) with intelligible entities, must be referred to the intelligible world. So also with philosophy, which occupies the first rank among sciences because it studies essence. This is all we have to say about arts and their products.
THE INTELLIGIBLE WORLD CONTAINS ONLY UNIVERSAL IDEAS; PARTICULARITIES ARE DERIVED FROM MATTER.

12. If the intelligible world contains the idea of Man, it must also contain that of the reasonable man, and of the artist; and consequently the idea of the arts that are begotten by Intelligence. We must therefore insist that the intelligible world contains the ideas of the universals, the idea of Man as such, and not, for instance, that of Socrates. Still we shall have to decide whether the intelligible world does not also contain the idea of the individual man, that is, of the man considered with the things that differ in each individual; for one may have a Roman nose and the other a pug nose. These differences are indeed implied within the idea of man, just as there are differences within the idea of animal. But the differences between a Roman or a snub nose are derived from matter. Likewise, amidst the varieties of colors, some are contained within the seminal reason, while others are derived from matter and space.

116
BESIDES IDEAS OF INDIVIDUAL SOULS AND INTELLIGENCE, THE INTELLIGIBLE WORLD CONTAINS THE SOUL ITSELF AND INTELLIGENCE ITSELF.

13. It remains for us to study whether the intelligible world contains only what is in the sense-world, or whether we should distinguish from the individual soul the Soul itself, from the particular intelligence, Intelligence itself, as we have above distinguished the particular man from Man himself. We should not consider all things here below as images of archetypes, for instance, the soul of a man as the image of the Soul herself. Only degrees of dignity differentiate souls; but these souls are not the Soul itself. As the Soul itself exists really, it must also contain a certain wisdom, justice and science, which are not images of wisdom, justice, and intelligible science, as sense-objects are images of intelligible entities, but which are these very entities located here below in entirely different conditions of existence; for they are not locally circumscribed. Therefore when the soul issues from the body, she preserves these things within herself; for the sense-world exists only in a determinate place, while the intelligible world exists everywhere; therefore all that the soul contains here below is also in the intelligible world. Consequently if, by "sense-objects" we really mean "visible" things, then indeed the intelligible world contains entities not present in this sense-world. If, on the contrary, we include within the "sense-world" the soul and all she implies, then all things that are above are present here below also.
THE SUPREME BEING ENTIRELY ONE DOES NOT EXPLAIN THE ORIGIN OF THE MANIFOLD.

14. Can we identify the nature that contains all the intelligibles (Intelligence) with the supreme Principle? Impossible, because the supreme Principle must117 be essentially one, and simple, while essences form a multitude. But as these essences form a multitude, we are forced to explain how this multitude, and all these essences can exist. How can (the single) Intelligence be all these things? Whence does it proceed? This we shall have to study elsewhere.146
THE SOUL RECEIVES ACCIDENTS FROM MATTER, BUT DEFECTS ARE NOT IN THE INTELLIGIBLE.

It may further be asked whether the intelligible world contains the ideas of objects which are derived from decay, which are harmful or disagreeable, such as, for instance, mud or excreta. We answer that all the things that universal Intelligence receives from the First are excellent. Among them are not found ideas of those dirty and vile objects mentioned above; Intelligence does not contain them. But though receiving from Intelligence ideas, the soul receives from matter other things, among which may be found the above-mentioned accidents. Besides, a more thorough answer to this question must be sought for in our book where we explain "How the Multitude of Ideas Proceeds from the One."147
NOT ALL EARTHLY ENTITIES HAVE CORRESPONDING IDEAS.

In conclusion, the accidental composites in which Intelligence does not share and which are formed by a fortuitous complex of sense-objects, have no ideas corresponding to them in the intelligible world. Things that proceed from decay are produced only because the Soul is unable to produce anything better in this case; otherwise she would have rather produced some object more agreeing with nature; she therefore produces what she can.

118
EVEN THE ARTS ARE DEPENDENT ON THE SOUL.

All the arts concerned with things natural to man are contained within the ideas of Man himself. The Art that is universal is prior to the other arts; but Art is posterior to the Soul herself, or rather, to the life that is in Intelligence before becoming soul, and which, on becoming soul, deserves to be called the Soul herself.
DIFFICULT PASSAGES.

(Transcriber's note: see footnotes 134a and 148.)

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