Tratado 28 (IV, 4, 1) – SPEECH OF SOUL IN THE INTELLIGIBLE WORLD (Guthrie)

SPEECH OF SOUL IN THE INTELLIGIBLE WORLD.

1. When the soul will have risen to the intelligible world, what will she say, and what will she remember ? She will contemplate the beings to which she will be united and she will apply her whole attention thereto; otherwise, she would not be in the intelligible world.

MEMORY OF SOUL IN THE INTELLIGIBLE WORLD.

Will she have no memory of things here below? Will she not, for instance, remember that she devoted herself to philosophy; and that, during her residence on the earth, she contemplated the intelligible world? No: for an intelligence entirely devoted to the object of its thought, cannot simultaneously contemplate the intelligible and think something else. The act of thought does not imply the memory of having thought.

IN THE INTELLIGIBLE WORLD ALL THINGS ARE SIMULTANEOUS; HENCE NOT REMEMBERED.

But this memory is posterior to thought! In this case, the mind in which it occurs has changed condition. It is therefore impossible that he who is entirely devoted to the pure contemplation of the intelligible should simultaneously remember the things that formerly happened to him here below. If, as it seems, thought is outside of time, because all the intelligible essences, being eternal, have no relation with time, it is evidently impossible that the intelligence which has raised itself to the intelligible world should have any memory of the things here below, or even have absolutely any memory whatever; for each (of the essences of the intelligible world) are always present to the intelligence which is not obliged to go through them successively, passing from one to the other.

INTELLIGENCE UNITES AS IT RISES TO THE INTELLIGIBLE.

Will not the intelligence divide itself in descending (from the genera) to the species (or forms) ? No: for she reascends to the universal and the superior Principle.

NOT EVEN THE ASCENDED SOUL NEED BE DIVIDED.

Granting then that there is no division in the intelligence which possesses everything simultaneously; will there not at least be division in the soul which has risen to the intelligible world? Nothing however forbids that the totality of the united intelligibles be grasped by an intuition equally unitary and total.

THE UNITY OF APPERCEPTION IS MANIFOLD.

Is this intuition similar to the intuition of an object grasped In its entirety by a single glance, or does it contain all the thoughts of the intelligibles contemplated simultaneously? Since the intelligibles offer a varied spectacle, the thought which grasps them must evidently be equally multiple and varied, comprehending several thoughts, like the perception of a single sense-object, as for instance that of a face comprehends several perceptions because the eye, on perceiving the face, simultaneously sees the nose and the other features.

IN THE INTELLIGIBLE ANTERIORITY REFERS TO ORDER, NOT TO TIME.

It may be objected that it may happen that the soul will divide and develop something which was unitary. This thing must then already have been divided in intelligence, but such a division is more like an impression. As anteriority or posteriority in ideas does not refer to time, so also will the mental conception of anteriority and posteriority not be subject to temporal conditions, but refer to order (which presides over intelligible things). For instance, on considering a tree’s order that extends from the roots to the tree-top, priority and posteriority exists only under the relation of order, inasmuch as the whole plant is perceived at one single glance.

INTELLIGENCE IS NOT A UNITY; BUT ITS MANIFOLD IS PRODUCED BY A UNITY.

How can things be prior or posterior, if the soul that contemplates the One embrace all things? The potentiality which is One is one in such a manner that it is multiple when it is contemplated by another principle (Intelligence), because then it is not simultaneously all things in one single thought. Indeed, the actualizations (of Intelligence) are not a unity; but they are all produced by an ever permanent potentiality; they therefore become multiple in the other principles (the intelligibles); for Intelligence, not being unity itself, can receive within its breast the nature of the multiple which did not formerly exist (in the One).