Plotino – Tratado 5,6 (V, 9, 6) — O Intelecto e as coisas que são

6. La Inteligencia es, por tanto, lo mismo que los seres. Y los contiene a todos en sí misma, no como en un lugar, sino por el hecho de que se contiene a sí misma y es a la vez una unidad para los seres. En el mundo inteligible todos los seres se dan juntamente y no por ello menos separados. También el alma reúne en sí misma varias ciencias, sin que ninguna confusión se produzca entre ellas; porque, cuando lo necesita, cada una de las ciencias realiza su propia obra, sin tener que arrastrar consigo a las demás. Esto es, cada pensamiento actúa libre de toda mezcla con los otros pensamientos interiores al alma. Así también, pero todavía en mayor grado, la Inteligencia lo es todo a la vez y en cierto modo no lo es, porque cada ser constituye una fuerza particular. La Inteligencia lo contiene todo, como el género contiene a las especies o como el todo contiene a las partes. Las fuerzas seminales nos traen una imagen de ella, porque todas las propiedades de un ser se encuentran de manera indistinta en el todo. Las razones también están ahí como en un centro único. Pero hay una razón del ojo, como hay asimismo una razón de las manos; la diferencia existente entre ellas se aprecia tan sólo por los órganos sensibles que han engendrado.

Cada una de las fuerzas seminales forma una razón única con las partes que están contenidas en ella. Esta razón tiene como materia un cuerpo, por ejemplo un cuerpo líquido, aunque ella misma sea una forma completa, e idéntica a la especie de alma generadora, la cual, ciertamente, constituye una imagen de otra alma superior. Algunos llaman naturaleza a esta fuerza seminal. Ella misma, habiendo salido de otras fuerzas que la preceden, como la luz salió del fuego, cambia e informa la materia, pero no con un impulso hacia adelante o valiéndose de esas renombradas palancas, sino haciéndola partícipe de sus razones.

VI. Ainsi, l’Intelligence est les êtres; elle les renferme tous en elle, non d’une manière locale, mais de la manière dont elle se possède elle-même ; elle ne fait qu’un avec eux. Toutes les essences à la fois sont contenues en elle et y restent distinctes, comme une foule de connaissances peuvent se trouver dans l’âme sans que leur nombre cause aucune confusion : car chacune paraît lorsqu’il le faut, sans entraîner les autres avec elle. Si dans l’âme chaque pensée est un acte indépendant des autres pensées, l’Intelligence doit à plus forte raison être toutes choses à la fois, avec cette restriction cependant que chacune d’elles est une puissance particulière. Prise dans son universalité, l’Intelligence contient toutes les essences comme le genre contient les espèces, le tout, les parties. Les puissances séminales mêmes portent l’empreinte de cette universalité. Chacune prise dans sa totalité est un centre qui contient indivises toutes les parties de l’organisme; cependant la raison des yeux y diffère de celle des mains, et cette diversité se manifeste par celle des organes qui sont engendrés (24). Chacune des puissances de la semence est donc l’unité totale de la raison séminale quand cette puissance est réunie aux autres qui sont impliquées en elle (25). Ce qui est corporel dans la semence contient delà matière, l’humide, par exemple ; mais la raison séminale est la forme entière ; elle est identique à la puissance généralive, puissance qui est elle-même l’image d’une puissance supérieure de l’âme. Cette puissance générative qiâ se trouve dans les semences s’appelle ordinairement nature. Procédant des puissances supérieures comme la lumière rayonne du feu, elle dompte et façonne la matière, en lui donnant la raison séminale (26), sans la pousser ni la mouvoir par des leviers.

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). 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 is usually called “nature.” Proceeding from the superior powers as light radiates from the fire, it tames and fashions matter, imparting thereto the seminal reason without pushing it, or moving it as by levers.

VI. Let, therefore, intellect be [real] beings, and possess all things in itself, not as in place but as itself, and as being one with them. But all things there subsist collectively at once, and yet nevertheless they are separated from each other; since the soul also which has many sciences in itself simultaneous, possesses them without any confusion. Each also, when it is requisite, performs what pertains to it, without the co-operation of the rest. And each conception energizes with a purity unmingled with the other inward conceptions. Thus, therefore, and in a still greater degree, intellect is at once all things; and again, not at once, because each is a peculiar power. Every intellect however, comprehends all things,1 in the same manner as genus comprehends species, and as whole comprehends parts. The powers of seeds, likewise, bring with them an image of what we have said. For in the whole seed, all things are without separation, and the reasons [or productive principles] are as it were in one centre. That there is one productive principle likewise of the eye, and another of the hand, is known from what is sensibly generated from them. With respect, therefore, to the powers in seeds, each of them is one whole productive principle, together with the parts comprehended in it. And that which is corporeal indeed in the seeds, possesses a certain quantity of matter which is as it were moist; but the productive principle itself is according to the whole of its form, and the same thing is also reason, generating a certain thing by the form of a soul, and which is the image of another more excellent soul. Some, however, denominate this principle which is inserted in the seeds, nature; which being thence excited from things prior to itself, in the same manner as light from fire, changes and gives form to matter; effecting this, not by impulsion, nor by employing levers [or any other mechanical power], but by imparting seminal productive principles.

6. We take it, then, that the Intellectual-Principle is the authentic existences and contains them all – not as in a place but as possessing itself and being one thing with this its content. All are one there and yet are distinct: similarly the mind holds many branches and items of knowledge simultaneously, yet none of them merged into any other, each acting its own part at call quite independently, every conception coming out from the inner total and working singly. It is after this way, though in a closer unity, that the Intellectual-Principle is all Being in one total – and yet not in one, since each of these beings is a distinct power which, however, the total Intellectual-Principle includes as the species in a genus, as the parts in a whole. This relation may be illustrated by the powers in seed; all lies undistinguished in the unit, the formative ideas gathered as in one kernel; yet in that unit there is eye-principle, and there is hand-principle, each of which is revealed as a separate power by its distinct material product. Thus each of the powers in the seed is a Reason-Principle one and complete yet including all the parts over which it presides: there will be something bodily, the liquid, for example, carrying mere Matter; but the principle itself is Idea and nothing else, idea identical with the generative idea belonging to the lower soul, image of a higher. This power is sometimes designated as Nature in the seed-life; its origin is in the divine; and, outgoing from its priors as light from fire, it converts and shapes the matter of things, not by push and pull and the lever work of which we hear so much, but by bestowal of the Ideas.