Tratado 27 (IV, 3, 1-8) - Alma do Mundo e Alma Individual (Guthrie)

FOURTH ENNEAD, BOOK THREE. Psychological Questions.

A. ARE NOT ALL SOULS PARTS OR EMANATIONS OF A SINGLE SOUL ?

• psychology obeys the precept “know thyself,” and shows how we are temples of the divinity.

• are individual souls emanations of the universal soul?

• conformity to the universal soul implies that they are not parts of her.

• limitations to the use of the term “parts,” in physical things.

• when applied to incorporeal things, “parts” have different senses.

• such mathematical senses cannot be applied to the soul.

• actual division into parts would be tantamount to a denial of the whole.

• nor is the soul a part in the sense that one proposition is a part of a science.

• the difference of functions of the world-soul and individual souls makes entire division between them impossible.

• are individual souls part of the world-soul as is the local consciousness of some part of the body to the whole consciousness?

• study of the question by observation of the human organism.

• intellectual difficulty of the soul being one and yet in all beings.

• the healthy soul can work, the sick soul is devoted to her body.

• souls retain both their unity and differences on different levels.

• souls develop manifoldness just as intelligence does.

• why should creation be predicated of the universal soul and not of the human?

• the world-soul alone creates because she remains nearest the intelligible world.

• difference between individual and universal souls.

• sympathy between individual and universal soul comes from common source.

• difference between souls.

• like the divinity, the soul is always one.

• soul powers remain the same throughout all changes of body.