genus

For these last are opposed as members of one species or of one genus, and, within that common ground, they participate in some common quality. Enneads I,8,

Now to the content of the divine order, the fixed quality, the measuredness and so forth – there is opposed the content of the evil principle, its unfixedness, measurelessness and so forth: total is opposed to total. The existence of the one genus is a falsity, primarily, essentially, a falseness: the other genus has Essence-Authentic: the opposition is of truth to lie; essence is opposed to essence. Enneads I,8,

In sum, things utterly sundered, having nothing in common, standing at the remotest poles, are opposites in nature: the contrariety does not depend upon quality or upon the existence of a distinct genus of beings, but upon the utmost difference, clash in content, clash in effect. Enneads I,8,

The principle may be illustrated from the different classes of animal life: there is one genus, horse, though horses among themselves fight and bite and show malice and angry envy: so all the others within the unity of their Kind; and so humanity. Enneads III,3,

All that is Intellectual-Principle has its being – whole and all – in the place of Intellection, what we call the Intellectual Kosmos: but there exist, too, the intellective powers included in its being, and the separate intelligences – for the Intellectual-Principle is not merely one; it is one and many. In the same way there must be both many souls and one, the one being the source of the differing many just as from one genus there rise various species, better and worse, some of the more intellectual order, others less effectively so. Enneads IV,8,

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. Enneads V,8,

At this point it would be natural to investigate which of the ten belong to both spheres, and whether the Existents of the Intellectual are to be ranged under one and the same genus with the Existents in the Sensible, or whether the term “Existence” [or Substance] is equivocal as applied to both realms. If the equivocation exists, the number of genera will be increased: if there is no equivocation, it is strange to find the one same “Existence” applying to the primary and to the derivative Existents when there is no common genus embracing both primal and secondary. Enneads: VI I

But are we really obliged to posit the existence of such genera? Take Substance, for Substance must certainly be our starting-point: what are the grounds for regarding Substance as one single genus? It has been remarked that Substance cannot be a single entity common to both the Intellectual and the Sensible worlds. We may add that such community would entail the existence of something prior to Intellectual and Sensible Substances alike, something distinct from both as predicated of both; and this prior would be neither body nor unembodied; for it were one or the other, body would be unembodied, or the unembodied would be the body. Enneads: VI I

Supposing we grant that all things known as substances are homogeneous as possessing something denied to the other genera, what precisely is this something, this individuality, this subject which is never a predicate, this thing not present in any thing as in a subject, this thing which does not owe its essential character to any other thing, as a quality takes character from a body and a quantity from a substance, as time is related to motion and motion to the moved? The Second Substance is, it is true, a predicate. But predication in this case signifies a different relation from that just considered; it reveals the genus inherent in the subject and the subject’s essential character, whereas whiteness is predicated of a thing in the sense of being present in the thing. Enneads: VI I

The properties adduced may indeed be allowed to distinguish Substance from the other Existents. They afford a means of grouping substances together and calling them by a common name. They do not however establish the unity of a genus, and they do not bring to light the concept and the nature of Substance. Enneads: VI I

In sum, we hold that there is no single genus of Quantity. Only number is Quantity, the rest [magnitudes, space, time, motion] quantities only in a secondary degree. We have therefore not strictly one genus, but one category grouping the approximate with the primary and the secondary. Enneads: VI I

Equality and inequality must be regarded as properties of Quantity-Absolute, not of the participants, or of them not essentially but only accidentally: such participants as “three yards’ length,” which becomes a quantity, not as belonging to a single genus of Quantity, but by being subsumed under the one head, the one category. Enneads: VI I

In considering Relation we must enquire whether it possesses the community of a genus, or whether it may on other grounds be treated as a unity. Enneads: VI I

Now if the condition of being related is regarded as a Form having a generic unity, Relation must be allowed to be a single genus owing its reality to a Reason-Principle involved in all instances. If however the Reason-Principles [governing the correlatives] stand opposed and have the differences to which we have referred, there may perhaps not be a single genus, but this will not prevent all relatives being expressed in terms of a certain likeness and falling under a single category. Enneads: VI I

But even if the cases of which we have spoken can be subsumed under a single head, it is nevertheless impossible to include in a single genus all that goes with them in the one common category: for the category includes negations and derivatives – not only, for example, double but also its negative, the resultant doubleness and the act of doubling. But we cannot include in one genus both the thing and its negative – double and not-double, relative and not-relative – any more than in dealing with the genus animal we can insert in it the nonanimal. Moreover, doubleness and doubling have only the relation to double that whiteness has to white; they cannot be classed as identical with it. Enneads: VI I

As regards Quality, the source of what we call a “quale,” we must in the first place consider what nature it possesses in accordance with which it produces the “qualia,” and whether, remaining one and the same in virtue of that common ground, it has also differences whereby it produces the variety of species. If there is no common ground and the term Quality involves many connotations, there cannot be a single genus of Quality. Enneads: VI I

Again, not all qualities can be regarded as Reason-Principles: chronic disease cannot be a Reason-Principle. Perhaps, however, we must speak in such cases of privations, restricting the term “Quantities” to Ideal-Forms and powers. Thus we shall have, not a single genus, but reference only to the unity of a category. Knowledge will be regarded as a Form and a power, ignorance as a privation and powerlessness. Enneads: VI I

A point for consideration is how the quale, as conditioned by Quality, can belong to the same category: obviously there can be no single genus embracing both. Enneads: VI I

With regard to Date: If “yesterday,” “to-morrow,” “last year” and similar terms denote parts of time, why should they not be included in the same genus as time? It would seem only reasonable to range under time the past, present and future, which are its species. But time is referred to Quantity; what then is the need for a separate category of Date? If we are told that past and future – including under past such definite dates as yesterday and last year which must clearly be subordinate to past time – and even the present “now” are not merely time but time – when, we reply, in the first place, that the notion of time – when involves time; that, further, if “yesterday” is time-gone-by, it will be a composite, since time and gone-by are distinct notions: we have two categories instead of the single one required. Enneads: VI I

Furthermore, if “in time,” “in place” are to be ranged under a category other than that applying to time and place, why not a separate category for “in a vessel”? Why not distinct categories for “in Matter,” “in a subject,” “a part in a whole,” “a whole in its parts,” “a genus in its species,” “a species in a genus”? We are certainly on the way to a goodly number of categories. Enneads: VI I

The “category of Action”: The quantum has been regarded as a single genus on the ground that Quantity and Number are attributes of Substance and posterior to it; the quale has been regarded as another genus because Quality is an attribute of Substance: on the same principle it is maintained that since activity is an attribute of Substance, Action constitutes yet another genus. Enneads: VI I

Does then the action constitute the genus, or the activity from which the action springs, in the same way as Quality is the genus from which the quale is derived? Perhaps activity, action and agent should all be embraced under a single head? But, on the one hand, the action – unlike activity – tends to comport the agent; and on the other, it signifies being in some activity and therefore Being-in-Act [actual as distinct from potential Being]. Consequently the category will be one of Act rather than of Action. Enneads: VI I

Act moreover incontestably manifests itself in Substance, as was found to be the case with Quality: it is connected with Substance as being a form of motion. But Motion is a distinct genus: for, seeing that Quality is a distinct attribute of Substance, and Quality a distinct attribute, and Relative takes its being from the relation of one substance to another, there can be no reason why Motion, also an attribute of Substance, should not also constitute a distinct genus. Enneads: VI I

We may be told that neither Act nor Motion requires a genus for itself, but that both revert to Relation, Act belonging to the potentially active, Motion to the potentially motive. Our reply is that Relation produces relatives as such, and not the mere reference to an external standard; given the existence of a thing, whether attributive or relative, it holds its essential character prior to any relationship: so then must Act and Motion, and even such an attribute as habit; they are not prevented from being prior to any relationship they may occupy, or from being conceivable in themselves. Otherwise, everything will be relative; for anything you think of – even Soul – bears some relationship to something else. Enneads: VI I

If however activity is referred to Relation and the action made a distinct genus, why is not Motion referred to Relation and the movement made a distinct genus? Why not bisect the unity, Motion, and so make Action and Passion two species of the one thing, ceasing to consider Action and Passion as two genera? Enneads: VI I

We have to ask ourselves whether there are not certain Acts which without the addition of a time-element will be thought of as imperfect and therefore classed with motions. Take for instance living and life. The life of a definite person implies a certain adequate period, just as his happiness is no merely instantaneous thing. Life and happiness are, in other words, of the nature ascribed to Motion: both therefore must be treated as motions, and Motion must be regarded as a unity, a single genus; besides the quantity and quality belonging to Substance we must take count of the motion manifested in it. Enneads: VI I

But though not opposed, it is still different from Action and cannot belong to the same genus as activity; though if they are both Motion, it will so belong, on the principle that alteration must be regarded as qualitative motion. Enneads: VI I

Even so, the term is not used without qualification: we say “they are placed in such and such a manner,” “he is situated in such and such a position.” The position is added from outside the genus. Enneads: VI I

There are those who lay down four categories and make a fourfold division into Substrates, Qualities, States, and Relative States, and find in these a common Something, and so include everything in one genus. Enneads: VI I

Against this theory there is much to be urged, but particularly against this posing of a common Something and a single all-embracing genus. This Something, it may be submitted, is unintelligible to themselves, is indefinable, and does not account either for bodies or for the bodiless. Moreover, no room is left for a differentia by which this Something may be distinguished. Besides, this common Something is either existent or non-existent: if existent, it must be one or other of its [four] species; – if non-existent, the existent is classed under the non-existent. But the objections are countless; we must leave them for the present and consider the several heads of the division. Enneads: VI I

To the first genus are assigned Substrates, including Matter, to which is given a priority over the others; so that what is ranked as the firsfirst principle comes under the same head with things which must be posterior to it since it is their principle. Enneads: VI I

First, then: the prior is made homogeneous with the subsequent. Now this is impossible: in this relation the subsequent owes its existence to the prior, whereas among things belonging to one same genus each must have, essentially, the equality implied by the genus; for the very meaning of genus is to be predicated of the species in respect of their essential character. And that Matter is the basic source of all the rest of things, this school, we may suppose, would hardly deny. Enneads: VI I

If Matter is taken to be the only Existent, and all other things as modifications of Matter, it is not legitimate to set up a single genus to embrace both the Existent and the other things; consistency requires that Being [Substance] be distinguished from its modifications and that these modifications be duly classified. Enneads: VI I

If however they hold Qualities to be composite, that is a strange classification which first contrasts simple and composite qualities, then proceeds to include them in one genus, and finally includes one of the two species [simple] in the other [composite]; it is like dividing knowledge into two species, the first comprising grammatical knowledge, the second made up of grammatical and other knowledge. Enneads: VI I

Again, if they identify Qualities with qualifications of Matter, then in the first place even their Seminal Principles [Logoi] will be material and will not have to reside in Matter to produce a composite, but prior to the composite thus produced they will themselves be composed of Matter and Form: in other words, they will not be Forms or Principles. Further, if they maintain that the Seminal Principles are nothing but Matter in a certain state, they evidently identify Qualities with States, and should accordingly classify them in their fourth genus. If this is a state of some peculiar kind, what precisely is its differentia? Clearly the state by its association with Matter receives an accession of Reality: yet if that means that when divorced from Matter it is not a Reality, how can State be treated as a single genus or species? Certainly one genus cannot embrace the Existent and the Non-existent. Enneads: VI I

Further, how can States constitute a single genus, when there is such manifold diversity among them? How can we group together three yards long” and “white” – Quantity and Quality respectively? Or again Time and Place? How can “yesterday,” “last year,” “in the Lyceum,” “in the Academy,” be States at all? How can Time be in any sense a State? Neither is Time a State nor the events in Time, neither the objects in Space nor Space itself. Enneads: VI I

As for the Relative State, if the theory does not include it in the same genus as the other States, another question arises: we must enquire whether any actuality is attributed to this particular type of relation, for to many types actuality is denied. Enneads: VI I

It is, moreover, absurd that an entity which depends upon the prior existence of other entities should be classed in the same genus with those priors: one and two must, clearly, exist, before half and double can. Enneads: VI I

We have examined the proposed “ten genera”: we have discussed also the theory which gathers the total of things into one genus and to this subordinates what may be thought of as its four species. The next step is, naturally, to expound our own views and to try to show the agreement of our conclusions with those of Plato. Enneads VI,2,

Now if we were obliged to consider Being as a unity, the following questions would be unnecessary: Is there one genus embracing everything, or are there genera which cannot be subsumed under such a unity? Are there first-principles? Are first-principles to be identified with genera, or genera with first-principles? Or is it perhaps rather the case that while not all genera are first-principles, all first-principles are at the same time genera? Or is the converse true? Or again, do both classes overlap, some principles being also genera, and some genera also principles? And do both the sets of categories we have been examining imply that only some principles are genera and some genera principles? or does one of them presuppose that all that belongs to the class of genera belongs also to the class of principles? Since, however, we affirm that Being is not a unity – the reason for this affirmation is stated by Plato and others – these questions become imperative, once we are satisfied as to the number of genera to be posited and the grounds for our choice. Enneads VI,2,

What is that which, often taken for Being [for the Existent], is in our view Becoming and never really Being? Note however that these concepts are not to be taken as distinguished from each other in the sense of belonging to a genus, Something, divided into Being and Becoming; and we must not suppose that Plato took this view. It would be absurd to assign Being to the same genus as non-Being: this would be to make one genus of Socrates and his portrait. The division here [between what has Being and what is in Becoming] means a definite marking-off, a setting asunder, leading to the assertion that what takes the appearance of Being is not Being and implying that the nature of True Being has been quite misapprehended. Being, we are taught, must have the attribute of eternity, must be so constituted as never to belie its own nature. Enneads VI,2,

It follows that either the unity so regarded is a unity of genus under which the Existents, involving as they do plurality as well as unity, stand as species; or that while there are more genera than one, yet all are subordinate to a unity; or there may be more genera than one, though no one genus is subordinate to any other, but all with their own subordinates – whether these be lesser genera, or species with individuals for their subordinates – all are elements in one entity, and from their totality the Intellectual realm – that which we know as Being – derives its constitution. Enneads VI,2,

For these and many other reasons we must abstain from positing a single genus, and especially because neither Being nor Substance can be the predicate of any given thing. If we do predicate Being, it is only as an accidental attribute; just as when we predicate whiteness of a substance, we are not predicating the Absolute Whiteness. Enneads VI,2,

But even admitting this derivation from a unity – a unity however not predicated of them in respect of their essential being – there is, surely, no reason why each of these Existents, distinct in character from every other, should not in itself stand as a separate genus. Enneads VI,2,

We pass on, then, to consider that which is included, and find to our surprise the cause included with the things it causes: it is surely strange that causes and effects should be brought into the same genus. Enneads VI,2,

But if the cause is included with its effects only in the sense in which a genus is included with its subordinates, the subordinates being of a different order, so that it cannot be predicated of them whether as their genus or in any other relation, these subordinates are obviously themselves genera with subordinates of their own: you may, for example, be the cause of the operation of walking, but the walking is not subordinate to you in the relation of species to genus; and if walking had nothing prior to it as its genus, but had posteriors, then it would be a [primary] genus and rank among the Existents. Enneads VI,2,

Having thus introduced Intellect and its life we make a single genus of what is common to all life, namely, Motion. Substance and the Motion, which constitutes the highest life, we must consider as two genera; for even though they form a unity, they are separable to thought which finds their unity not a unity; otherwise, it could not distinguish them. Enneads VI,2,

Being, then, containing many species, has but one genus. Motion, however, is to be classed as neither a subordinate nor a supplement of Being but as its concomitant; for we have not found Being serving as substrate to Motion. Motion is being Act; neither is separated from the other except in thought; the two natures are one; for Being is inevitably actual, not potential. Enneads VI,2,

Stability, then, may also be taken as a single genus. Obviously distinct from Motion and perhaps even its contrary, that it is also distinct from Being may be shown by many considerations. We may especially observe that if Stability were identical with Being, so also would Motion be, with equal right. Why identity in the case of Stability and not in that of Motion, when Motion is virtually the very life and Act both of Substance and of Absolute Being? However, on the very same principle on which we separated Motion from Being with the understanding that it is the same and not the same – that they are two and yet one – we also separate Stability from Being, holding it, yet, inseparable; it is only a logical separation entailing the inclusion among the Existents of this other genus. To identify Stability with Being, with no difference between them, and to identify Being with Motion, would be to identify Stability with Motion through the mediation of Being, and so to make Motion and Stability one and the same thing. Enneads VI,2,

They will, moreover, be primary genera, because nothing can be predicated of them as denoting their essential nature. Nothing, of course we mean, but Being; but this Being is not their genus, since they cannot be identified with any particular being as such. Similarly, Being will not stand as genus to Motion or Stability, for these also are not its species. Beings [or Existents] comprise not merely what are to be regarded as species of the genus Being, but also participants in Being. On the other hand, Being does not participate in the other four principles as its genera: they are not prior to Being; they do not even attain to its level. Enneads VI,2,

The above considerations – to which others, doubtless, might be added – suffice to show that these five are primary genera. But that they are the only primary genera, that there are no others, how can we be confident of this? Why do we not add unity to them? Quantity? Quality? Relation, and all else included by our various forerunners? As for unity: If the term is to mean a unity in which nothing else is present, neither Soul nor Intellect nor anything else, this can be predicated of nothing, and therefore cannot be a genus. If it denotes the unity present in Being, in which case we predicate Being of unity, this unity is not primal. Enneads VI,2,

Besides, unity, containing no differences, cannot produce species, and not producing species, cannot be a genus. You cannot so much as divide unity: to divide it would be to make it many. Unity, aspiring to be a genus, becomes a plurality and annuls itself. Enneads VI,2,

It may be contended that the unity which is implicit in Being and in Motion is common to all other things, and that therefore Being and unity are inseparable. But we rejected the idea that Being is a genus comprising all things, on the ground that these things are not beings in the sense of the Absolute Being, but beings in another mode: in the same way, we assert, unity is not a genus, the Primary Unity having a character distinct from all other unities. Enneads VI,2,

Admitted that not everything suffices to produce a genus, it may yet be urged that there is an Absolute or Primary Unity corresponding to the other primaries. But if Being and unity are identified, then since Being has already been included among the genera, it is but a name that is introduced in unity: if, however, they are both unity, some principle is implied: if there is anything in addition [to this principle], unity is predicated of this added thing; if there is nothing added, the reference is again to that unity predicated of nothing. If however the unity referred to is that which accompanies Being, we have already decided that it is not unity in the primary sense. Enneads VI,2,

Again, even taking it as bound up with Being: If it is a consequent of Being, then it is a consequent of everything, and therefore the latest of things: but the genus takes priority. If it is simultaneous with Being, it is simultaneous with everything: but a genus is not thus simultaneous. If it is prior to Being, it is of the nature of a Principle, and therefore will belong only to Being; but if it serves as Principle to Being, it is not its genus: if it is not genus to Being, it is equally not a genus of anything else; for that would make Being a genus of all other things. Enneads VI,2,

In sum, the unity exhibited in Being on the one hand approximates to Unity-Absolute and on the other tends to identify itself with Being: Being is a unity in relation to the Absolute, is Being by virtue of its sequence upon that Absolute: it is indeed potentially a plurality, and yet it remains a unity and rejecting division refuses thereby to become a genus. Enneads VI,2,

It follows that unity is not a genus. For a genus is such that wherever it is affirmed its opposites cannot also be affirmed; anything of which unity and its opposites are alike affirmed – and this implies the whole of Being – cannot have unity as a genus. Consequently unity can be affirmed as a genus neither of the primary genera – since the unity of Being is as much a plurality as a unity, and none of the other [primary] genera is a unity to the entire exclusion of plurality – nor of things posterior to Being, for these most certainly are a plurality. In fact, no genus with all its items can be a unity; so that unity to become a genus must forfeit its unity. The unit is prior to number; yet number it must be, if it is to be a genus. Enneads VI,2,

Again, just as the unit, appearing in numbers, not regarded as a genus predicated of them, but is thought of as inherent in them, so also unity, though present in Being, cannot stand as genus to Being or to the other genera or to anything whatever. Enneads VI,2,

Further, as the simplex must be the principle of the non-simplex, though not its genus – for then the non-simplex too would be simplex, – so it stands with unity; if unity is a Principle; it cannot be a genus to its subsequents, and therefore cannot be a genus of Being or of other things. If it is nevertheless to be a genus, everything of which it is a genus must be taken as a unit – a notion which implies the separation of unity from substance: it will not, therefore, be all-embracing. just as Being is not a genus of everything but only of species each of which is a being, so too unity will be a genus of species each of which is a unity. But that raises the question of what difference there is between one thing and another in so far as they are both units, corresponding to the difference between one being and another. Enneads VI,2,

Unity, it may be suggested, is divided in its conjunction with Being and Substance; Being because it is so divided is considered a genus – the one genus manifested in many particulars; why then should not unity be similarly a genus, inasmuch as its manifestations are as many as those of Substance and it is divided into as many particulars? In the first place, the mere fact that an entity inheres in many things is not enough to make it a genus of those things or of anything else: in a word, a common property need not be a genus. The point inherent in a line is not a genus of lines, or a genus at all; nor again, as we have observed, is the unity latent in numbers a genus either of the numbers or of anything else: genus demands that the common property of diverse objects involve also differences arising out of its own character, that it form species, and that it belong to the essence of the objects. But what differences can there be in unity? What species does it engender? If it produces the same species as we find in connection with Being, it must be identical with Being: only the name will differ, and the term Being may well suffice. Enneads VI,2,

How, then, do we characterize the unity [thus diverse] in Being? Are we to think of it as a common property seen alike in all its parts? In the first place, the point is common to lines and yet is not their genus, and this unity we are considering may also be common to numbers and not be their genus – though, we need hardly say, the unity of Unity-Absolute is not that of the numbers, one, two and the rest. Secondly, in Being there is nothing to prevent the existence of prior and posterior, simple and composite: but unity, even if it be identical in all the manifestations of Being, having no differentiae can produce no species; but producing no species it cannot be a genus. Enneads VI,2,

But how are the five genera to be regarded? Do they form particulars by being broken up into parts? No; the genus exists as a whole in each of the things whose genus it is. Enneads VI,2,

But how, at that, can it remain a unity? The unity of a genus must be considered as a whole-in-many. Enneads VI,2,

Quantity is not among the primaries, because these are permanently associated with Being. Motion is bound up with Actual Being [Being-in-Act], since it is its life; with Motion, Stability too gained its foothold in Reality; with these are associated Difference and Identity, so that they also are seen in conjunction with Being. But number [the basis of Quantity] is a posterior. It is posterior not only with regard to these genera but also within itself; in number the posterior is divided from the prior; this is a sequence in which the posteriors are latent in the priors [and do not appear simultaneously]. Number therefore cannot be included among the primary genera; whether it constitutes a genus at all remains to be examined. Enneads VI,2,

Magnitude [extended quantity] is in a still higher degree posterior and composite, for it contains within itself number, line and surface. Now if continuous magnitude derives its quantity from number, and number is not a genus, how can magnitude hold that status? Besides, magnitudes, like numbers, admit of priority and posteriority. Enneads VI,2,

If, then, Quantity be constituted by a common element in both number and magnitude, we must ascertain the nature of this common element, and consider it, once discovered, as a posterior genus, not as one of the Primaries: thus failing of primary status, it must be related, directly or indirectly, to one of the Primaries. Enneads VI,2,

But the problem of the origin of number and magnitude, or rather of how they subsist and are conceived, must be held over. It may, thus, be found that number is among the primary genera, while magnitude is posterior and composite; or that number belongs to the genus Stability, while magnitude must be consigned to Motion. But we propose to discuss all this at a later stage. Enneads VI,2,

Place and Date are still more remote from Being. Place denotes the presence of one entity within another, so that it involves a duality; but a genus must be a unity, not a composite. Besides, Place does not exist in the higher sphere, and the present discussion is concerned with the realm of True Being. Enneads VI,2,

Why are not beauty, goodness and the virtues, together with knowledge and intelligence, included among the primary genera? If by goodness we mean The First – what we call the Principle of Goodness, the Principle of which we can predicate nothing, giving it this name only because we have no other means of indicating it – then goodness, clearly, can be the genus of nothing: this principle is not affirmed of other things; if it were, each of these would be Goodness itself. The truth is that it is prior to Substance, not contained in it. If, on the contrary, we mean goodness as a quality, no quality can be ranked among the primaries. Enneads VI,2,

But the other genera too, we said, are constituents of Being, and are regarded as genera because each is a common property found in many things. If then goodness is similarly observed in every part of Substance or Being, or in most parts, why is goodness not a genus, and a primary genus? Because it is not found identical in all the parts of Being, but appears in degrees, first, second and subsequent, whether it be because one part is derived from another – posterior from prior – or because all are posterior to the transcendent Unity, different parts of Being participating in it in diverse degrees corresponding to their characteristic natures. Enneads VI,2,

If however we must make goodness a genus as well [as a transcendent source], it will be a posterior genus, for goodness is posterior to Substance and posterior to what constitutes the generic notion of Being, however unfailingly it be found associated with Being; but the Primaries, we decided, belong to Being as such, and go to form Substance. Enneads VI,2,

Intelligence, since it connotes intelligent Being and comprises the total of existence, cannot be one of the genera: the true Intelligence [or Intellect] is Being taken with all its concomitants [with the other four genera]; it is actually the sum of all the Existents: Being on the contrary, stripped of its concomitants, may be counted as a genus and held to an element in Intelligence. Enneads VI,2,

Justice and self-control [sophrosyne], and virtue in general – these are all various Acts of Intelligence: they are consequently not primary genera; they are posterior to a genus, that is to say, they are species. Enneads VI,2,

Having established our four primary genera, it remains for us to enquire whether each of them of itself alone produces species. And especially, can Being be divided independently, that is without drawing upon the other genera? Surely not: the differentiae must come from outside the genus differentiated: they must be differentiae of Being proper, but cannot be identical with it. Enneads VI,2,

A word of warning must here be given against sinking the various genera in their species; and also against reducing the genus to a mere predicate, something merely seen in the species. The genus must exist at once in itself and in its species; it blends, but it must also be pure; in contributing along with other genera to form Substance, it must not destroy itself. There are problems here that demand investigation. Enneads VI,2,

The great Intellect, we maintain, exists in itself and the particular intellects in themselves; yet the particulars are embraced in the whole, and the whole in the particulars. The particular intellects exist by themselves and in another, the universal by itself and in those. All the particulars exist potentially in that self-existent universal, which actually is the totality, potentially each isolated member: on the other hand, each particular is actually what it is [its individual self], potentially the totality. In so far as what is predicated of them is their essence, they are actually what is predicated of them; but where the predicate is a genus, they are that only potentially. On the other hand, the universal in so far as it is a genus is the potentiality of all its subordinate species, though none of them in actuality; all are latent in it, but because its essential nature exists in actuality before the existence of the species, it does not submit to be itself particularized. If then the particulars are to exist in actuality – to exist, for example, as species – the cause must lie in the Act radiating from the universal. Enneads VI,2,

It is certainly no numerical unity, no individual thing; for whatever you find in that sphere is a species, since it is divorced from Matter. This may be the import of the difficult words of Plato, that Substance is broken up into an infinity of parts. So long as the division proceeds from genus to species, infinity is not reached; a limit is set by the species generated: the lowest species, however – that which is not divided into further species – may be more accurately regarded as infinite. And this is the meaning of the words: “to relegate them once and for all to infinity and there abandon them.” As for particulars, they are, considered in themselves, infinite, but come under number by being embraced by the [total] unity. Enneads VI,2,

If Soul acts as a genus or a species, the various [particular] souls must act as species. Their activities [Acts] will be twofold: the activity upward is Intellect; that which looks downward constitutes the other powers imposed by the particular Reason-Principle [the Reason-Principle of the being ensouled]; the lowest activity of Soul is in its contact with Matter to which it brings Form. Enneads VI,2,

We must begin on these lines: The subject of our discussion is the Sensible realm: Sensible Existence is entirely embraced by what we know as the Universe: our duty, then, would seem to be clear enough – to take this Universe and analyse its nature, classifying its constituent parts and arranging them by species. Suppose that we were making a division of speech: we should reduce its infinity to finite terms, and from the identity appearing in many instances evolve a unity, then another and another, until we arrived at some definite number; each such unit we should call a species if imposed upon individuals, a genus if imposed upon species. Thus, every species of speech – and similarly all phenomena – might be referred to a unity; speech – or element – might be predicated of them all. Enneads VI,3,

Alternatively, Becoming may be divided into Matter and the Form imposed upon Matter. These may be regarded each as a separate genus, or else both may be brought under a single category and receive alike the name of Substance. Enneads VI,3,

But what, we may ask, have Matter and Form in common? In what sense can Matter be conceived as a genus, and what will be its species? What is the differentia of Matter? In which genus, Matter or Form, are we to rank the composite of both? It may be this very composite which constitutes the Substance manifested in bodies, neither of the components by itself answering to the conception of Body: how, then, can we rank them in one and the same genus as the composite? How can the elements of a thing be brought within the same genus as the thing itself? Yet if we begin with bodies, our first-principles will be compounds. Enneads VI,3,

Matter will be found common to all substances, not however as a genus, since it has no differentiae – unless indeed differentiae be ascribed to it on the ground of its taking such various forms as fire and air. Enneads VI,3,

It may be held that Matter is sufficiently constituted a genus by the fact that the things in which it appears hold it in common, or in that it presents itself as a whole of parts. In this sense Matter will indeed be a genus, though not in the accepted sense of the term. Matter, we may remark, is also a single element, if the element as such is able to constitute a genus. Enneads VI,3,

Further, if to a Form be added the qualification “bound up with, involved in Matter,” Matter separates that Form from other Forms: it does not however embrace the whole of Substantial Form [as, to be the genus of Form, it must]. Enneads VI,3,

The first three entities [Matter, Form, Composite] go, as we have discovered, to make a single common genus, the Sensible counterpart of Substance. Then follow in order Relation, Quantity, Quality, Time-during-which, Place-in-which, Motion; though, with Time and Space already included [under Relation], Time-during-which and Place-in-which become superfluous. Enneads VI,3,

But once concede that Form is higher in the scale of Being than Matter, and Matter can no longer be regarded as a common ground of both, nor Substance as a genus embracing Matter, Form and the Couplement. True, these will have many common properties, to which we have already referred, but their being [or existence] will nonetheless be different. When a higher being comes into contact with a lower, the lower, though first in the natural order, is yet posterior in the scale of Reality: consequently, if Being does not belong in equal degrees to Matter, to Form and to the Couplement, Substance can no longer be common to all three in the sense of being their genus: to their posteriors it will bear a still different relation, serving them as a common base by being bound up with all alike. Substance, thus, resembles life, dim here, clearer there, or portraits of which one is an outline, another more minutely worked. By measuring Being by its dim manifestation and neglecting a fuller revelation elsewhere, we may come to regard this dim existence as a common ground. Enneads VI,3,

Our plan must be to apprehend what is constant in stone, earth, water and the entities which they compose – the vegetal and animal forms, considered purely as sensibles – and to confine this constant within a single genus. Neither Matter nor Form will thus be overlooked, for Sensible Substance comports them; fire and earth and the two intermediaries consist of Matter and Form, while composite things are actually many substances in one. They all, moreover, have that common property which distinguishes them from other things: serving as subjects to these others, they are never themselves present in a subject nor predicated of any other thing. Similarly, all the characteristics which we have ascribed to Substance find a place in this classification. Enneads VI,3,

But what are we to posit as its species? how divide this genus? The genus as a whole must be identified with body. Bodies may be divided into the characteristically material and the organic: the material bodies comprise fire, earth, water, air; the organic the bodies of plants and animals, these in turn admitting of formal differentiation. Enneads VI,3,

Moreover, such a difference, if established, would be incompatible with a single Reason-Principle of Substance; First and Second Substance could not have the same Principle, nor be brought under a single genus. Enneads VI,3,

But how are we to differentiate the continuous, comprising as it does line, surface and solid? The line may be rated as of one dimension, the surface as of two dimensions, the solid as of three, if we are only making a calculation and do not suppose that we are dividing the continuous into its species; for it is an invariable rule that numbers, thus grouped as prior and posterior, cannot be brought into a common genus; there is no common basis in first, second and third dimensions. Yet there is a sense in which they would appear to be equal – namely, as pure measures of Quantity: of higher and lower dimensions, they are not however more or less quantitative. Enneads VI,3,

Again, when I find Quality bound up with Substance, I regard it as substantial quality: I am not less, but far more, disposed to see in figures or shapes [qualitative] varieties of Quantity. Besides, if we are not to regard them as varieties of magnitude, to what genus are we to assign them? Suppose, then, that we allow differences of magnitude; we commit ourselves to a specific classification of the magnitudes so differentiated. Enneads VI,3,

Here a difficulty may be raised: we divide the varieties of Substance and their functions and activities, fair or foul or indeed of any kind whatsoever, on the basis of Quality, Quantity rarely, if ever, entering into the differences which produce species; Quantity, again, we divide in accordance with qualities of its own: how then are we to divide Quality itself into species? what differences are we to employ, and from what genus shall we take them? To take them from Quality itself would be no less absurd than setting up substances as differences of substances. Enneads VI,3,

These problems at any rate all serve to show that, while in general it is necessary to look for differences by which to separate things from each other, to hunt for differences of the differences themselves is both futile and irrational. We cannot have substances of substances, quantities of quantities, qualities of qualities, differences of differences; differences must, where possible, be found outside the genus, in creative powers and the like: but where no such criteria are present, as in distinguishing dark-green from pale-green, both being regarded as derived from white and black, what expedient may be suggested? Sense-perception and intelligence may be trusted to indicate diversity but not to explain it: explanation is outside the province of sense-perception, whose function is merely to produce a variety of information; while, as for intelligence, it works exclusively with intuitions and never resorts to explanations to justify them; there is in the movements of intelligence a diversity which separates one object from another, making further differentiation unnecessary. Enneads VI,3,

It remains to decide whether there can be any differentia derived from the genus to which the differentiated thing belongs, or whether it must of necessity belong to another genus? The former alternative would produce differentiae of things derived from the same genus as the differentiae themselves – for example, qualities of qualities. Virtue and vice are two states differing in quality: the states are qualities, and their differentiae qualities – unless indeed it be maintained that the state undifferentiated is not a quality, that the differentia creates the quality. Enneads VI,3,

In the case of virtue and vice, whole must be compared with whole, and the differentiation conducted on this basis. As for the differentia being derived from the same genus as themselves, namely, Quality, and from no other genus, if we proceed on the principle that virtue is bound up with pleasure, vice with lust, virtue again with the acquisition of food, vice with idle extravagance, and accept these definitions as satisfactory, then clearly we have, here too, differentiae which are not qualities. Enneads VI,3,

But how are we to classify such terms as “not white”? If “not white” signifies some other colour, it is a quality. But if it is merely a negation of an enumeration of things not white, it will be either a meaningless sound, or else a name or definition of something actual: if a sound, it is a kind of motion; if a name or definition, it is a relative, inasmuch as names and definitions are significant. But if not only the things enumerated are in some one genus, but also the propositions and terms in question must be each of them significative of some genus, then we shall assert that negative propositions and terms posit certain things within a restricted field and deny others. Perhaps, however, it would be better, in view of their composite nature, not to include the negations in the same genus as the affirmations. Enneads VI,3,

Nonetheless, we must endeavour to find a meaning for the term “contrary.” Can we accept the principle that when things have a certain similarity which is not generic nor in any sense due to admixture, but a similarity residing in their forms – if the term be permitted – they differ in degree but are not contraries; contraries being rather those things which have no specific identity? It would be necessary to stipulate that they belong to the same genus, Quality, in order to cover those immediate contraries which [apparently] have nothing conducing to similarity, inasmuch as there are no intermediates looking both ways, as it were, and having a mutual similarity to each other; some contraries are precluded by their isolation from similarity. Enneads VI,3,

The claim of Motion to be established as a genus will depend upon three conditions: first, that it cannot rightly be referred to any other genus; second, that nothing higher than itself can be predicated of it in respect of its essence; third, that by assuming differences it will produce species. These conditions satisfied, we may consider the nature of the genus to which we shall refer it. Enneads VI,3,

What, then, is that entity, called Motion, which, though attributive, has an independent reality, which makes its attribution possible – the entity corresponding to Quality, Quantity and Substance? But first, perhaps, we should make sure that there is nothing prior to Motion and predicated of it as its genus. Enneads VI,3,

Change may be suggested as a prior. But, in the first place, either it is identical with Motion, or else, if change be claimed as a genus, it will stand distinct from the genera so far considered: secondly, Motion will evidently take rank as a species and have some other species opposed to it – becoming, say – which will be regarded as a change but not as a motion. Enneads VI,3,

That Motion is a genus we may be all the more confident in virtue of the difficulty – the impossibility even – of confining it within a definition. Enneads VI,3,

Is, then, becoming ill identical with becoming well? As motions they are identical. In what respect, then, do they differ? In their substrates? or is there some other criterion? This question may however be postponed until we come to consider alteration: at present we have to discover what is the constant element in every motion, for only on this basis can we establish the claim of Motion to be a genus. Enneads VI,3,

What view are we to take of that which is opposed to Motion, whether it be Stability or Rest? Are we to consider it as a distinct genus, or to refer it to one of the genera already established? We should, no doubt, be well advised to assign Stability to the Intellectual, and to look in the lower sphere for Rest alone. Enneads VI,3,

It may be declared that health or sickness is indeed some form of Stability: we are to suppose, then, that Stability is the genus of which health and sickness are species; which is absurd. Enneads VI,3,

But here we may be questioned about these numbers which we describe as the primal and authentic: “Where do you place these numbers, in what genus among Beings? To everyone they seem to come under Quantity and you have certainly brought Quantity in, where you say that discrete Quantity equally with the continuous holds place among Beings; but you go on to say that there are the numbers belonging to the Firsts and then talk of other numbers quite distinct, those of reckoning; tell us how you arrange all this, for there is difficulty here. And then, the unity in sense-things – is that a quantity or is quantity here just so many units brought together, the unity being the starting-point of quantity but not quantity itself? And, if the starting-point, is it a kindred thing or of another genus? All this you owe it to us to make clear.” Enneads VI,6,