I. What is the reason that souls become oblivious of divinity, being ignorant both of themselves and him, though their allotment is from thence, and they in short partake of God ? The principle therefore of evil to them is audacity, generation, the first difference,1 and the wish to exercise an unrestrained freedom of the will. When, therefore, they began to be delighted with this unbounded liberty, abundantly employing the power of being moved from themselves, they ran in a direction contrary [to their first course], and thus becoming most distant from their source, they were at length ignorant that they were thence derived. Just as children who are immediately torn from their parents, and have for a long time been nurtured at a great distance from them, become ignorant both of themselves and their parents. Hence, souls neither seeing their father, nor themselves, despise themselves through ignorance of their race, but honour other things, and admiring every thing rather than themselves, being vehemently astonished about, and adhering to sensible natures, they as much as possible hurl themselves [from their true parents], and thus despise the beings from which they have become elongated. Hence, the honour which they pay to sensible objects, and the contempt of themselves,, happen to be the causes of their all-perfect ignorance. For at the same time they pursue and admire something else, and acknowledge themselves to be inferior to that which they admire and pursue. But the soul admitting that it is something subordinate to things which are generated and corrupted, and apprehending that it is the most ignoble and mortal of every thing which it honours, neither believes in the nature nor power of God. Hence, it is necessary that there should be a twofold discourse to those who are thus affected, in order to convert them to the contraries [to the things they admire], and to first natures, and to elevate them as far as to that which is highest, and one, and the first. What, therefore, is each of these discourses ? One of them, indeed, is that which shows the cause why the soul honours these sensible objects, which we have elsewhere largely discussed ; but the other teaches and reminds the soul of the greatness of its origin, and its true dignity; which discussion is prior to the former, and when manifested will render that manifest. Of this, therefore, we must now speak. For this is proximate and conducive to the object of enquiry. For that which is investigated is soul; and what it investigates should be known by it, in order that it may in the first place learn whether it has the power of investigating things of this kind; and also whether it has such an eye as is able to see them, and whether they are properly objects of its enquiry. For if they are foreign to its nature, why should it investigate them ? But if they are allied to it, it is expedient and possible to discover them.
The five genera of being are, essence, sameness, difference, motion and permanency. This difference, therefore,.which ranks as the first, and which is the source of all diversity, causes souls by predominating in them to he forgetful of deity, and themselves. ↩