Plotino – Tratado 45,10 (III, 7, 10) — Tempo como acompanhamento do movimento

10. Si se considera el tiempo como algo que acompaña al movimiento, no será posible mostrar, ni siquiera decir lo que es, antes de haber explicado lo que significa la palabra acompañar. Deberíamos examinar primero si este acompañamiento es posterior, simultáneo o anterior al movimiento. Sea lo que sea, diremos de él que se realiza en el tiempo, con lo cual el tiempo resulta ser un acompañamiento del movimiento en el tiempo. Mas nosotros buscamos, no lo que el tiempo no es, sino lo que el tiempo es. Repetidamente muchos de nuestros antepasados han tratado a su modo la cuestión, de tal manera que sí se examinase en detalle sus afirmaciones, y lo mismo cuanto se ha dicho a la ligera sobre estas cosas, compondríamos más bien una verdadera historia. Sin embargo, es posible una respuesta a la afirmación de que el tiempo es la medida del movimiento del universo; porque todo lo que nosotros hemos dicho contra la doctrina del tiempo como medida del movimiento se vuelve también contra esa tesis, salvo en lo concerniente a la irregularidad del movimiento. Conviene, por tanto, que prosigamos la investigación y que digamos lo que debe pensarse sobre lo que es el tiempo.

X. Il est nécessaire pour cela que nous revenions à la nature que nous avons plus haut reconnue être essentielle à l’éternité, à cette vie immuable, réalisée tout entière à la fois, infinie, parfaite, subsistant dans l’unité et se rapportant à l’unité. Le temps n’était pas encore, ou du moins il n’était pas pour les intelligibles ; seulement, il devait en naître, parce qu’il leur est [comme le monde] postérieur par sa raison et sa nature (51) ? Veut-on comprendre comment le temps est sorti du sein des intelligibles, lorsqu’ils reposaient en eux-mêmes? Il serait inutile ici d’invoquer les Muses : elles n’existaient pas encore. Que dis-je ? Peut-être ne serait-ce pas inutile : car elles existaient déjà [en un certain sens] (52). Quoi qu’il en soit, on connaîtra la naissance du temps si on le considère en tant qu’il est né et manifesté. Voici ce qu’on peut dire à ce sujet.

Avant qu’il y eût antériorité et postériorité, le temps, qui n’existait pas encore, reposait au sein de l’Être même. Mais une nature active [l’Âme universelle], qui désirait être maîtresse d’elle-même, se posséder elle-même et ajouter sans cesse au présent, entra en mouvement, et le temps entra en mouvement avec elle. En nous portant toujours nous-mêmes vers ce qui suit et qui est postérieur, vers un autre moment, puis vers un autre encore, nous parvenons, par la longueur que nous parcourons, à nous représenter le temps qui est l’image de l’éternité (53).

Comme l’Âme universelle avait en elle une activité qui l’agitait et la poussait à transporter dans un autre inonde ce qu’elle voyait toujours là-haut, elle n’a pas pu posséder toutes choses présentes à la fois. De même qu’une raison, en se développant hors de la semence où elle reposait, semble marcher à la pluralité, mais affaiblit cette pluralité par la division, et que prodiguant, au lieu de l’unité qui demeure en elle-même, l’unité qui est hors d’elle-même, elle perd de sa force en s’étendant; de même l’Âme universelle, en produisant le monde sensible, mû, non par le mouvement intelligible, mais par celui qui n’en est que l’image, et en travaillant à rendre ce mouvement semblable au premier, s’est d’abord rendue elle-même temporelle, en engendrant le temps au lieu de l’éternité, puis a soumis son œuvre [le inonde sensible] au temps, en embrassant dans le temps toute l’existence et toutes les révolutions du monde. En effet, comme le monde se meut dans l’Âme universelle, qui est son lieu, il se meut aussi dans le temps, que cette Âme porte en elle (54). En manifestant sa puissance d’une manière successive et variée, l’Âme universelle a engendré la succession par son mode d’action : elle passe en effet d’une conception à une autre, par conséquent à ce qui n’existait pas auparavant, puisque cette conception n’était pas effective et que la vie présente de l’Âme ne ressemble pas à sa vie antérieure. Sa vie est variée, et de la variété de sa vie résulte la variété du temps (55).

Ainsi, l’extension de la vie de l’Âme produit le temps, la progression perpétuelle de sa vie fait la perpétuité du temps, et sa vie antérieure constitue le passé. On peut donc avec justesse définir le temps la vie de l’Âme considérée dans le mouvement par lequel elle passe d’un acte à un autre (56).

Puisque l’éternité est la vie caractérisée par le repos, l’identité , l’immutabilité , l’infinité , si le temps est son image, comme ce monde est l’image du monde supérieur, il faut reconnaître qu’il doit y avoir dans ce monde, au lieu de la vie propre à l’Intelligence , une autre vie qui porte le même nom et qui appartienne à cette puissance de l’Âme universelle; au lieu du mouvement de l’Intelligence, le mouvement propre à une partie de l’Âme (57); au lieu de la permanence, de l’identité, de l’immutabilité [de l’Intelligence], la mobilité d’un principe qui passe sans cesse d’un acte à un autre; au lieu de l’unité et de l’absence de toute étendue, une simple image de l’unité, image qui n’est une que par la continuité ; au lieu d’une infinité déjà présente tout entière, une| progression à l’infini qui tend perpétuellement vers ce qui suit ; au lieu de ce qui est tout entier & la fois, ce qui sera par parties et ne sera jamais tout entier à la fois (58). Pour offrir l’image de la vie complète, universelle, infinie de l’Intelligence, il faut que l’Âme ait pour existence d’acquérir sans cesse l’existence; c’est ainsi qu’elle peut représenter par son essence l’essence intelligible.

Le temps n’est donc pas extérieur à l’Âme, pas plus que l’éternité ne l’est à l’Être ; il n’en est pas non plus une conséquence ni un résultat, pas plus que l’éternité n’est une conséquence de l’Être. Il apparaît dans l’Âme, il est en elle et avec elle, comme l’éternité est dans l’Être et avec l’Être.

THE NATURE OF TIME WILL BE REVEALED BY ITS ORIGIN.

10. (11). To accomplish this we shall have to return to the nature which, as we pointed out above, was essential to eternity; that immutable life, wholly realized all at once, infinite and perfect, subsisting in, and referring to unity. Time was not yet, or at least, it did not yet exist for the intelligible entities. Only, it was yet to be born of them, because (as was the world), time, by both its reason and nature, was posterior to the (intelligible entities). Are we trying to understand how time issued from among intelligible entities while these were resting within themselves? Here it would be useless to call upon the Muses, for they did not yet exist. Still this might perhaps not be useless; for (in a certain sense, that time had already begun, then, so far as they existed within the sense-world) they existed already. In any case, the birth of time will be plain enough if we consider it only as it is born and manifested. Thus much can be said about it.

TIME AROSE AS MEASUREMENT OF THE ACTIVITY OF THE UNIVERSAL SOUL.

Before priority and posteriority, time, which did not yet exist, brooded within existence itself. But an active nature (the universal Soul), which desired to be mistress of herself, to possess herself, and ceaselessly to add to the present, entered into motion, as did time, along with (the Soul). We achieve a representation of the time that is the image of eternity, by the length that we must go through with to reach what follows, and is posterior, towards one moment, and then towards another.

LIKE TIME, SPACE IS THE RESULT OF THE PROCESSION OF THE UNIVERSAL SOUL.

As the universal Soul contained an activity that agitated her, and impelled her to transport into another world what she still saw on high, she was willing to retain all things that were present at the same time. (Time arose not by a single fiat, but as the result of a process. This occurred within the universal Soul, but may well be first illustrated by the more familiar process within) Reason, which distributes unity, not indeed That which remains within itself, but that which is exterior to itself. Though this process seem to be a strengthening one, reason developing out of the seed in which it brooded unto manifoldness, it is really a weakening (or destructive one), inasmuch as it weakened manifoldness by division, and weakened reason by causing it to extend. The case was similar with the universal Soul. When she produced the sense-world, the latter was animated by a movement which was only an image of intelligible movement. (While trying to strengthen) this image-movement to the extent of the intelligible movement, she herself (weakened), instead of remaining exclusively eternal, became temporal and (involuntarily) subjected what she had produced to the conditions of time, transferring entirely into time not only the universe, but also all its revolutions. Indeed, as the world moves within the universal Soul, which is its location, it also moves within the time that this Soul bears within herself. Manifesting her power in a varied and successive manner, by her mode of action, the universal Soul begat succession. Indeed, she passes from one conception to another, and consequently to what did not exist before, since this conception was not effective, and since the present life of the soul does not resemble her former life. Her life is varied, and from the variety of her life results the variety of time.

TIME IS THE LIFE OF THE SOUL CONSIDERED IN THE MOVEMENT BY WHICH SHE PASSES FROM ONE ACTUALIZATION TO ANOTHER.

Thus, the extension of the life of the soul produces time, and the perpetual progression of her life produces the perpetuity of time, and her former life constitutes the past. We may therefore properly define time as the life of the soul considered in the movement by which she passes from one actualization to another.

WHAT ETERNITY IS TO INTELLIGENCE, TIME IS TO THE UNIVERSAL SOUL.

We have already decided that eternity is life characterized by rest, identity, immutability and infinity (in intelligence). It is, further, (admitted that) this our world is the image of the superior World (of intelligence). We have also come to the conclusion that time is the image of eternity. Consequently, corresponding to the Life characteristic of Intelligence, this world must contain another life which bears the same name, and which belongs to that power of the universal Soul. Instead of the movement of Intelligence, we will have the movement characteristic of a part of the soul (as the universal Soul ceaselessly passes from one thought to another). Corresponding to the permanence, identity, and immutability (of Intelligence), we will have the mobility of a principle which ceaselessly passes from one actualization to another. Corresponding to the unity and the absence of all extension, we will have a mere image of unity, an image which exists only by virtue of continuity. Corresponding to an infinity already entirely present, we will have a progression towards infinity which perpetually tends towards what follows. Corresponding to what exists entirely at the same time, we will have what exists by parts, and what will never exist entire at the same time. The soul’s existence will have to be ceaseless acquiring of existence; if it is to reveal an image of the complete, universal and infinite existence of the soul; that is the reason its existence is able to represent the intelligible existence.

TIME IS AS INTERIOR TO THE SOUL AS ETERNITY IS TO EXISTENCE.

Time, therefore, is not something external to the soul, any more than eternity is exterior to existence. It is neither a consequence nor a result of it, any more than eternity is a consequence of existence. It appears within the soul, is in her and with her, as eternity is in and with existence.

X. Again, therefore, it is requisite that we should betake ourselves to that condition of being which we have said is in eternity; a condition which is immutable, and at once total, a life now infinite and perfectly inflexible, and abiding in one, and directed to the one. But time was not yet, or at least was not in those natures; but was about to be generated ¹ by the reason and nature of that which is posterior. Intelligibles, therefore, quietly energizing in themselves, he who desires to know how time first fell, will not perhaps call upon the Muses who did not then exist, to tell him. Perhaps, however, he will, since the Muses also then had a being.² Perhaps, too, he will find time itself generated, so far as it is generated and unfolded into light. Bnt he will speak about it as follows:

Before this priority originated, and was indigent of the posterior, the former was quiescent together with the latter in being, time not yet existing; but itself also quietly abiding [i.e. subsisting casually] in real being. A certain nature, however, much conversant with action, wishing to govern, and possess authority from itself, and chasing to explore more of the present, was itself indeed moved, and together with it likewise time, always tending to hereafter and the posterior, and not to the same, but to another, and again another existence. But we from this motion producing a certain length of progression, conceive time to be the image of eternity. For since there was a certain unquiet power of the soul, wishing always to transfer what it there saw to something else, it was not willing that an at-once-collected all should be present with it. But as reason [i.e. a productive principle] evolving itself from a quiet seed, produces as it fancies an abundant progression, abolishing the abundant by division, and instead of the one subsisting in itself, consuming the one which is not in itself, and thus proceeds into a more imbecile length; in a similar manner, this nature of soul, producing the sensible through the imitation of the intelligible world, and being moved not with the motion which is there, but with a motion resembling it, and wishing to be its image, in the first place indeed, renders itself temporal, producing this instead of eternity. In the next place, it causes that which is generated to be subservient to time, making the whole of it to be in time, and comprehending all the progressions of it in time. For the world is moved in the nature of soul; since there is not any other place of this universe than soul, and in the time of soul it is moved. For soul exhibiting its energy successively, generates together with its energy that which is successive, and proceeds in conjunction with another reasoning process after that energy, which was not before; since, neither was the discursive energy of reason effective, nor the present life of soul similar to that which preceded it. Hence, at the same time, there is another life, and this other life will have another time. Distance of life, therefore [or the interval between one life and another], will be attended with time. The perpetual extension of life also to the anterior part, will have perpetual time: and the past life will be accompanied with past time. If, therefore, some one should say that time is the energy of soul, proceeding in a transitive motion from one life to another, will he not appear to say something to the purpose ? ³ For if eternity is life consisting in permanency, and in an invariable sameness of subsistence, and which is now infinite, but it is necessary that time should be the image of eternity, just as this universe is the image of the intelligible world; — if this be the case, instead of the life which is there, it is necessary there should be another life of the discursive power of the mundane soul, homonymous as it were to the life of eternity; and instead of intellectual motion, that there should be the motion of a certain part of the soul. It is also necessary, that instead of an invariable sameness and permanency of subsistence, there should be that which does not abide in the same, but always has another and another energy. Likewise, that instead of an essence which is without interval and one, there should be an image of the one, and which possesses unity in continuity of succession. That instead of that which is now infinite, and a whole, there should be that which proceeds ad infinitum, according to what is perpetually successive. And that instead of an at-once-collected whole, there should be that which is a whole according to parts, and is always about to be a whole. For thus it will imitate that which is now wholly what it is, and which is at-once-collected, and infinite, if it wishes its being to consist in perpetual acquisition; since it will thus also imitate the being of eternity. It is necessary, however, not to assume time externally to soul, as neither is eternity in the intelligible world external to being. Nor again, must it be considered as any thing consecutive, or posterior to soul, as neither is eternity to being. But it must be beheld within, and subsisting together with soul, in the same manner as eternity with being.

10. Time, again, has been described as some sort of a sequence upon Movement, but we learn nothing from this, nothing is said, until we know what it is that produces this sequential thing: probably the cause and not the result would turn out to be Time.

And, admitting such a thing, there would still remain the question whether it came into being before the movement, with it, or after it; and, whether we say before or with or after, we are speaking of order in Time: and thus our definition is “Time is a sequence upon movement in Time!”

Enough: Our main purpose is to show what Time is, not to refute false definition. To traverse point by point the many opinions of our many predecessors would mean a history rather than an identification; we have treated the various theories as fully as is possible in a cursory review: and, notice, that which makes Time the Measure of the All-Movement is refuted by our entire discussion and, especially, by the observations upon the Measurement of Movement in general, for all the argument – except, of course, that from irregularity – applies to the All as much as to particular Movement.

We are, thus, at the stage where we are to state what Time really is.