Categoria: Tratados – Enéadas

Retirado da tradução em espanhol de Jesús Igal. En este tratado, el primero que compuso Plotino (Vida 4, 22), el más traducido y el más popularizado, se entrecruzan característicamente los dos temas fundamentales de la filosofía plotiniana: metafísica y mística. La decidida identificación de la belleza con la forma marca una revolución en la historia…

8. But what must we do? How lies the path? How come to vision of the inaccessible Beauty, dwelling as if in consecrated precincts, apart from the common ways where all may see, even the profane? He that has the strength, let him arise and withdraw into himself, foregoing all that is known by the…

5. These Lovers, then, lovers of the beauty outside of sense, must be made to declare themselves. What do you feel in presence of the grace you discern in actions, in manners, in sound morality, in all the works and fruits of virtue, in the beauty of souls? When you see that you yourselves are…

4. But there are earlier and loftier beauties than these. In the sense-bound life we are no longer granted to know them, but the soul, taking no help from the organs, sees and proclaims them. To the vision of these we must mount, leaving sense to its own low place. As it is not for…

3. And the soul includes a faculty peculiarly addressed to Beauty- one incomparably sure in the appreciation of its own, never in doubt whenever any lovely thing presents itself for judgement. Or perhaps the soul itself acts immediately, affirming the Beautiful where it finds something accordant with the Ideal-Form within itself, using this Idea as…

2. Let us, then, go back to the source, and indicate at once the Principle that bestows beauty on material things. Undoubtedly this Principle exists; it is something that is perceived at the first glance, something which the soul names as from an ancient knowledge and, recognising, welcomes it, enters into unison with it. But…

1. Beauty addresses itself chiefly to sight; but there is a beauty for the hearing too, as in certain combinations of words and in all kinds of music, for melodies and cadences are beautiful; and minds that lift themselves above the realm of sense to a higher order are aware of beauty in the conduct…

VIII. What measures, then, shall we adopt? What machine employ, or what reason consult, by means of which we may contemplate this ineffable beauty: a beauty abiding in the most divine sanctuary, without ever proceeding from its sacred retreats, lest it should be beheld by the profane and vulgar eye? We must enter deep into…

V. But it may be allowable to interrogate those who rise above sense, concerning the effects of love in this manner; of such we enquire, what do you suffer respecting fair studies, and beautiful manners, virtuous works, affections, and habits, and the beauty of souls? What do you experience on perceiving yourselves lovely within? After…

IV. But it is now time, leaving every object of sense far behind, to contemplate, a certain ascent, a beauty of a much higher order: a beauty not visible to the corporeal eye, but alone manifest to the brighter eye of the soul, independent of all corporeal aid. However, since, without some previous perception of…

III. But the soul, by her innate power, than which nothing more powerful, in judging its proper concerns, when another soul concurs in the decision, acknowledges the beauty of forms. And, perhaps, its knowledge in this case arises from its accommodating its internal ray of beauty to form, and trusting to this in its judgment;…

II. We still, therefore, repeat the question, what is the beauty of bodies? It is something, which, at first view, presents itself to sense; and which the soul familiarly apprehends, and eagerly embraces, as if it were allied to itself: But when it meets with the deformed, it hastily starts from the view, and retires…