species

Those, then, that set happiness not in the mere living but in the reasoning life seem to overlook the fact that they are not really making it depend upon life at all: they admit that this reasoning faculty, round which they centre happiness, is a property (not the subject of a property): the subject, to them, must be the Reasoning-Life since it is in this double term that they find the basis of the happiness: so that they are making it consist not in life but in a particular kind of life – not, of course, a SPECIES formally opposite but, in terminology, standing as an “earlier” to a “later” in the one Kind. Enneads I,4,

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,

No: all that ever appears upon it is brought in by the Idea: the Idea alone possesses: to it belongs the magnitude and all else that goes with the Reason-Principle or follows upon it. Quantity is given with the Ideal-Form in all the particular SPECIES – man, bird, and particular kind of bird. Enneads II,4,

But in fact everything follows its own Kind; the birth is a horse because it comes from the Horse Kind, a man by springing from the Human Kind; offspring answers to SPECIES. Allow the kosmic circuit its part, a very powerful influence upon the thing brought into being: allow the stars a wide material action upon the bodily part of the man, producing heat and cold and their natural resultants in the physical constitution; still does such action explain character, vocation and especially all that seems quite independent of material elements, a man taking to letters, to geometry, to gambling, and becoming an originator in any of these pursuits? And can we imagine the stars, divine beings, bestowing wickedness? And what of a doctrine that makes them wreak vengeance, as for a wrong, because they are in their decline or are being carried to a position beneath the earth – as if a decline from our point of view brought any change to themselves, as if they ever ceased to traverse the heavenly spheres and to make the same figure around the earth. Enneads: III I

Those that have maintained the human level are men once more. Those that have lived wholly to sense become animals – corresponding in SPECIES to the particular temper of the life – ferocious animals where the sensuality has been accompanied by a certain measure of spirit, gluttonous and lascivious animals where all has been appetite and satiation of appetite. Those who in their pleasures have not even lived by sensation, but have gone their way in a torpid grossness become mere growing things, for this lethargy is the entire act of the vegetative, and such men have been busy be-treeing themselves. Those, we read, that, otherwise untainted, have loved song become vocal animals; kings ruling unreasonably but with no other vice are eagles; futile and flighty visionaries ever soaring skyward, become highflying birds; observance of civic and secular virtue makes man again, or where the merit is less marked, one of the animals of communal tendency, a bee or the like. Enneads III,4,

If, on the other hand, Eternity is identified with the Repose of the divine Essence, all SPECIES outside of the divine are put outside of Eternity. Enneads III,7,

To this our first answer is that to place certain things under one identical class – by admitting an identical range of operation – is to make them of one common SPECIES, and puts an end to all mention of part; the reasonable conclusion would be, on the contrary, that there is one identical soul, every separate manifestation being that soul complete. Enneads IV,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,

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

But if these considerations are sound, why has Quality more than one SPECIES? What is the ground for distinguishing between habit and disposition, seeing that no differentia of Quality is involved in permanence and non-permanence? A disposition of any kind is sufficient to constitute a quality; permanence is a mere external addition. It might however be urged that dispositions are but incomplete “forms” – if the term may pass – habits being complete ones. But incomplete, they are not qualities; if already qualities, the permanence is an external addition. Enneads: VI I

How do physical powers form a distinct SPECIES? If they are classed as qualities in virtue of being powers, power, we have seen, is not a necessary concomitant of qualities. If, however, we hold that the natural boxer owes his quality to a particular disposition, power is something added and does not contribute to the quality, since power is found in habits also. Enneads: VI I

A further question would seem to be involved: If certain qualities are derived from experience but here is a discrepancy in the manner and source of the experience, how are they to be included in the same SPECIES? And again, if some create the experience, others are created by it, the term Quality as applied to both classes will be equivocal. Enneads: VI I

Knowledge of the meaning of “light” and “heavy” will reveal their place in the classification. An ambiguity will however be latent in the term “light,” unless it be determined by comparative weight: it would then implicate leanness and fineness, and involve another SPECIES distinct from the four (of Aristotle). 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

Consider, however, the proposition “Socrates – or some action – exists at this time”; what can be the meaning here other than “in a part of time”? But if, admitted that Date is “a part of time,” it be felt that the part requires definition and involves something more than mere time, that we must say the part of time gone by, several notions are massed in the proposition: we have the part which qua part is a relative; and we have “gone-by” which, if it is to have any import at all, must mean the past: but this “past,” we have shown, is a SPECIES of time. Enneads: VI I

The Academy and the Lyceum are places, and parts of Place, just as “above,” “below,” “here” are SPECIES or parts of Place; the difference is of minuter delimitation. 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

If it be urged that Motion is but imperfect Act, there would be no objection to giving priority to Act and subordinating to it Motion with its imperfection as a SPECIES: Act would thus be predicated of Motion, but with the qualification “imperfect.” 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

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

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 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

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,

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,

If this last is the truth, we have here not merely genera, but genera which are at the same time principles of Being. They are genera because they have subordinates – other genera, and successively SPECIES and individuals; they are also principles, since from this plurality Being takes its rise, constituted in its entirety from these its elements. Enneads VI,2,

If all the genera could be SPECIES of Being, all individuals without exception being immediately subordinate to these SPECIES, then such a unification becomes feasible. But that supposition bespeaks annihilation for the genera: the SPECIES will no longer be SPECIES; plurality will no longer be subordinated to unity; everything must be the unity, unless there exist some thing or things outside the unity. The One never becomes many – as the existence of SPECIES demands – unless there is something distinct from it: it cannot of itself assume plurality, unless we are to think of it as being broken into pieces like some extended body: but even so, the force which breaks it up must be distinct from it: if it is itself to effect the breaking up – or whatever form the division may take – then it is itself previously divided. 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,

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,

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,

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,

Again, you must add to it to divide it into SPECIES; for there can be no differentiae in unity as there are in Substance. The mind accepts differences of Being, but differences within unity there cannot be. Every differentia introduces a duality destroying the unity; for the addition of any one thing always does away with the previous quantity. Enneads VI,2,

In what sense is the particular manifestation of Being a unity? Clearly, in so far as it is one thing, it forfeits its unity; with “one” and “thing” we have already plurality. No SPECIES can be a unity in more than an equivocal sense: a SPECIES is a plurality, so that the “unity” here is that of an army or a chorus. The unity of the higher order does not belong to SPECIES; unity is, thus, ambiguous, not taking the same form in Being and in particular beings. 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,

Nevertheless, we ventured to assert elsewhere that while the complements of Substance are only by analogy called qualities, yet accessions of external origin and subsequent to Substance are really qualities; that, further, the properties which inhere in substances are their activities (Acts), while those which are subsequent are merely modifications (or Passions): we now affirm that the attributes of the particular substance are never complementary to Substance (as such); an accession of Substance does not come to the substance of man qua man; he is, on the contrary, Substance in a higher degree before he arrives at differentiation, just as he is already “living being” before he passes into the rational SPECIES. 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,

But if all come into existence simultaneously, what else is produced but that amalgam of all Existents which we have just considered (Intellect)? How can other things exist over and above this all-including amalgam? And if all the constituents of this amalgam are genera, how do they produce SPECIES? How does Motion produce SPECIES of Motion? Similarly with Stability and the other genera. 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,

But since we identified the amalgam of the Existents (or primary genera) with the particular intellect, Intellect as such being found identical with Being or Substance, and therefore prior to all the Existents, which may be regarded as its SPECIES or members, we may infer that the intellect, considered as completely unfolded, is a subsequent. Enneads VI,2,

We may thus distinguish two phases of Intellect, in one of which it may be taken as having no contact whatever with particulars and no Act upon anything; thus it is kept apart from being a particular intellect. In the same way science is prior to any of its constituent SPECIES, and the specific science is prior to any of its component parts: being none of its particulars, it is the potentiality of all; each particular, on the other hand, is actually itself, but potentially the sum of all the particulars: and as with the specific science, so with science as a whole. The specific sciences lie in potentiality in science the total; even in their specific character they are potentially the whole; they have the whole predicated of them and not merely a part of the whole. At the same time, science must exist as a thing in itself, unharmed by its divisions. 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,

Being, thus, exhibits every shape and every quality; it is not seen as a thing determined by some one particular quality; there could not be one only, since the principle of Difference is there; and since Identity is equally there, it must be simultaneously one and many. And so Being is; such it always was: unity-with-plurality appears in all its SPECIES, as witness all the variations of magnitude, shape and quality. Clearly nothing may legitimately be excluded (from Being), for the whole must be complete in the higher sphere which, otherwise, would not be the whole. 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,

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,

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,

The next step is to find the SPECIES of earth and of the other elements, and in the case of organic bodies to distinguish plants according to their forms, and the bodies of animals either by their habitations – on the earth, in the earth, and similarly for the other elements – or else as light, heavy and intermediate. Some bodies, we shall observe, stand in the middle of the universe, others circumscribe it from above, others occupy the middle sphere: in each case we shall find bodies different in shape, so that the bodies of the living beings of the heavens may be differentiated from those of the other elements. Enneads VI,3,

Once we have classified bodies into the four SPECIES, we are ready to combine them on a different principle, at the same time intermingling their differences of place, form and constitution; the resultant combinations will be known as fiery or earthy on the basis of the excess or predominance of some one element. 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,

It remains to enquire whether these SPECIES are themselves to be divided: the line into straight, circular, spiral; the surface into rectilinear and circular figures; the solid into the various solid figures – sphere and polyhedra: whether these last should be subdivided, as by the geometers, into those contained by triangular and quadrilateral planes: and whether a further division of the latter should be performed. 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,

Do all qualities constitute differentiae, or not? Granted that whiteness and colours in general and the qualities dependent upon touch and taste can, even while they remain SPECIES (of Quality), become differentiae of other things, how can grammar and music serve as differentiae? Perhaps in the sense that minds may be distinguished as grammatical and musical, especially if the qualities are innate, in which case they do become specific differentiae. 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,

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,

What, then, is the ground for denying that becoming is a motion? The fact, perhaps, that what comes to be does not yet exist, whereas Motion has no dealings with the non-existent. But, on that ground, becoming will not be a change either. If however it be alleged that becoming is merely a type of alteration or growth since it takes place when things alter and grow, the antecedents of becoming are being confused with becoming itself. Yet becoming, entailing as it does these antecedents, must necessarily be a distinct SPECIES; for the event and process of becoming cannot be identified with merely passive alteration, like turning hot or white: it is possible for the antecedents to take place without becoming as such being accomplished, except in so far as the actual alteration (implied in the antecedents) has “come to be”; where, however, an animal or a vegetal life is concerned, becoming (or birth) takes place only upon its acquisition of a Form. Enneads VI,3,

The contrary might be maintained: that change is more plausibly ranked as a SPECIES than is Motion, because change signifies merely the substitution of one thing for another, whereas Motion involves also the removal of a thing from the place to which it belongs, as is shown by locomotion. Even rejecting this distinction, we must accept as types of Motion knowledge and musical performance – in short, changes of condition: thus, alteration will come to be regarded as a SPECIES of Motion – namely, motion displacing. Enneads VI,3,

But in all these motions alike there is the common tendency to seek an appointed place, and in this tendency we seem to have the differentia which separates locomotion from the other SPECIES. Enneads VI,3,

Are we then to posit a new SPECIES for these two motions, adding to them, perhaps, alteration? A thing is altered by becoming dense – in other words, by integration; it is altered again by being rarefied – that is, by disintegration. When wine and water are mixed, something is produced different from either of the pre-existing elements: thus, integration takes place, resulting in alteration. Enneads VI,3,

Perhaps we should also distinguish, in each SPECIES, natural from unnatural motions: this distinction would however imply that motions have differences which are not external. It may indeed be the case that motions create these differences and cannot exist without them; but Nature may be supposed to be the ultimate source of motions and differences alike. Enneads VI,3,

Consider sickness and health. The convalescent moves in the sense that he passes from sickness to health. What SPECIES of rest are we to oppose to this convalescence? If we oppose the condition from which he departs, that condition is sickness, not Stability; if that into which he passes, it is health, again not the same as Stability. 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 how explain beings by the side of Being, and the variety of intelligences and of souls, when Being has the unity of omnipresent identity and not merely that of a SPECIES, and when intellect and soul are likewise numerically one? We certainly distinguish between the soul of the All and the particular souls. Enneads VI,4,

(An objector speaks-) “But the unity we thus possess comes by our acceptance of a certain idea or impression from things external; it is a notion derived from an object. Those that take the notion of numbers and of unity to be but one SPECIES of the notions held to be inherent in the mind must allow to numbers and to unity the reality they ascribe to any of the others, and upon occasion they must be met; but no such real existence can be posited when the concept is taken to be an attitude or notion rising in us as a by-product of the objects; this happens when we say “This,” “What,” and still more obviously in the affirmations “Crowd,” “Festival,” “Army,” “Multiplicity.” As multiplicity is nothing apart from certain constituent items and the festival nothing apart from the people gathered happily at the rites, so when we affirm unity we are not thinking of some Oneness self-standing, unrelated. And there are many other such cases; for instance “on the right,” “Above” and their opposites; what is there of reality about this “On-the-right-ness” but the fact that two different positions are occupied? So with “Above”: “Above” and “Below” are a mere matter of position and have no significance outside of this sphere. Enneads VI,6,