OUTLINE OF NATURES IN THE UNIVERSE.
Other principles remain unmoved while producing and exhibiting their ("hypostases," substantial acts, or) forms of existence. The (universal) Soul, however, is in motion while producing and exhibiting her ("substantial act," or) forms of existence, namely, the functions of sensation and growth, reaching down as far as (the sphere of the) plants. In us also does the Soul function, but she does not dominate us, constituting only a part of our nature. She does, however, dominate in plants, having as it were remained alone there. Beyond that sphere, however, nature begets nothing; for beyond it exists no life, begotten (matter) being lifeless. All that was begotten prior to this was shapeless, and achieved form only by trending towards its begetting principle, as to its source of life. Consequently, that which is begotten cannot be a form of the Soul, being lifeless, but must be absolute in determination. The things anterior (to matter, namely, the sense-power and nature), are doubtless indeterminate, but only so within their form; the are not absolutely indeterminate; they are indeterminate only in respect of their perfection. On the contrary, that which exists at present, namely, (matter), is absolutely indeterminate. When it achieves perfection, it becomes body, on receiving the form suited to its power. This (form) is the receptacle of the principle which has begotten it, and which nourishes it. It is the only trace of the higher things in the body, which occupies the last rank amidst the things below.
AFTER DEATH, MAN BECOMES WHAT HE HAS LIVED.
2. It is to this (universal) Soul especially that may be applied these words of Plato:[317] "The general Soul cares for all that is inanimate." The other (individual) souls are in different conditions. "The Soul (adds Plato), circulates around the heavens successively assuming divers forms"; that is, the forms of thought, sense or growth. The part which dominates in the soul fulfills its proper individual function; the others remain inactive, and somehow seem exterior to them. In man, it is not the lower powers of the soul that dominate. They do indeed co-exist with the others. Neither is it always the best power (reason), which always dominates; for the inferior powers equally have their place. Consequently, man (besides being a reasonable being) is also a sensitive being, because he possesses sense-organs. In many respects, he is also a vegetative being; for his body feeds and grows just like a plant. All these powers (reason, sensibility, growth), therefore act together in the man; but it is the best of them that characterizes the totality of the man (so that he is called a "reasonable being"). On leaving the body the soul becomes the power she had preponderatingly developed. Let us therefore flee from here below, and let us raise ourselves to the intelligible world, so as not to fall into the pure sense-life, by allowing ourselves to follow sense-images, or into the life of growth, by abandoning ourselves to the pleasures of physical love, and to gormandizing; rather, let us rise to the intelligible world, to the intelligence, to the divinity!
LAWS OF TRANSMIGRATION.
Those who have exercised their human faculties are re-born as men. Those who have made use of their senses only, pass into the bodies of brutes, and particularly into the bodies of wild animals, if they have yielded themselves to the transports of anger; so that, even in this case, the difference of the bodies they animate is proportioned to the difference of their inclinations. Those whose only effort it was to satisfy their desires and appetites pass into the bodies of lascivious and gluttonous animals.[318] Last, those who instead of following their desires or their anger, have rather degraded their senses by their inertia, are reduced to vegetate in plants; for in their former existence they exercised nothing but their vegetative power, and they worked at nothing but to make trees of themselves.[319] Those who have loved too much the enjoyments of music, and who otherwise lived purely, pass into the bodies of melodious birds. Those who have reigned tyrannically, become eagles, if they have no other vice.[320] Last, those who spoke lightly of celestial things, having kept their glance directed upwards, are changed into birds which usually fly towards the high regions of the air.[321] He who has acquired civil virtues again becomes a man; but if he does not possess them to a sufficient degree, he is transformed into a sociable animal, such as the bee, or other animal of the kind.
OUR GUARDIAN IS THE NEXT HIGHER FACULTY OF OUR BEING.
3. What then is our guardian? It is one of the powers of our soul. What is our divinity? It is also one of the powers of our soul. (Is it the power which acts principally in us as some people think?) For the power which acts in us seems to be that which leads us, since it is the principle which dominates in us. Is that the guardian to which we have been allotted during the course of our life?[323] No: our guardian is the power immediately superior to the one that we exercise, for it presides over our life without itself being active. The power which is active in us is inferior to the one that presides over our life, and it is the one which essentially constitutes us. If then we live on the plane of the sense-life, our guardian is reason; if we live on the rational plane, our guardian will be the principal superior to reason (namely, intelligence); it will preside over our life, but it itself does not act, leaving that to the inferior power. Plato truly said that "we choose our guardian"; for, by the kind of life that we prefer, we choose the guardian that presides over our life. Why then does He direct us? He directs us during the course of our mortal life (because he is given to us to help us to accomplish our (destiny); but he can no longer direct us when our destiny is accomplished, because the power over the exercise of which he presided allows another power to act in his place (which however is dead, since the life in which it acted is terminated). This other power wishes to act in its turn, and, after having established its preponderance, it exercises itself during the course of a new life, itself having another guardian. If then we should chance to degrade ourselves by letting an inferior power prevail in us, we are punished for it. Indeed, the evil man degenerates because the power which he has developed in his life makes him descend to the existence of the brute, by assimilating him to it by his morals. If we could follow the guardian who is superior to him, he himself would become superior by sharing his life. He would then take as guide a part of himself superior to the one that governs him, then another part, still more elevated until he had arrived at the highest. Indeed, the soul is several things, or rather, the soul is all things; she is things both inferior and superior; she contains all the degrees of life. Each of us, in a certain degree, is the intelligible world; by our inferior part we are related to the sense-world, and by our superior part, to the intelligible world; we remain there on high by what constitutes our intelligible essence; we are attached here below by the powers which occupy the lowest rank in the soul. Thus we cause an emanation, or rather an actualization which implies no loss to the intelligible, to pass from the intelligible into the sense-world.