[Plotinus, Ennead 5.8.4, trans. Armstrong, 249–51. The second passage is actually taken from Ennead 5.8.9: “Let us then apprehend in our thought this visible universe, with each of its parts remaining what it is without confusion, gathering all of them together into one as far as we can, so that when any one part appears first, for instance the outside heavenly sphere, the imagination of the sun and, with it, the other heavenly bodies follow immediately, and the earth and sea and all the living creatures are seen, as they could in fact all be seen inside a transparent sphere. Let there be, then, in the soul a shining imagination of a sphere, having everything within it, either moving or standing still, or some things moving and others standing still. Keep this, and apprehend in your mind another, taking away the mass: take away also the places, and the mental picture of matter in yourself, and do not try to apprehend another sphere smaller in mass than the original one, [but calling on the god who made that of which you have the mental picture, pray him to come]. And may he come, bringing his own universe with him, with all the gods within him, he who is one and all, and each god is all the gods coming together into one; they are different in their powers, but by that one manifold power they are all one” (ibid., 265– 67). It was necessary to add the section of this passage which Camus himself omits in order to make its meaning clear.—Trans.]
subject, in which pure thought is only thought of itself. It is by a progressive concentration, by diving into itself, that Intelligence takes hold of its inner wealth. Do we want to go further? Again Plotinus appeals to an image: “[The unbounded is in Intellect in this way, that it is one as one-many, not like one lump but like a rational forming principle multiple in itself,] in the one figure of Intellect holding as within an outline outlines inside itself and again figurations inside powers and thoughts; and its division does not go in a straight line, but moves always to the interior, as the natures of living beings are included in and belong to the smaller living things and the weaker powers, where it will come to a stop at the indivisible form.”30It is through the reshaping of the enclosure that Intelligence takes hold of its most profound truth. This Being that lies at the bottom of all things, that gives to the world its existence and its true meaning, draws all of its unity from its origin. And scattered in its intelligibles though being known as Intelligence, it is the ideal intermediary between the indefinable Good that we hope for and the Soul that breathes behind sensible appearances.
d) The Third Hypostasis.31“It occupies a middle rank among realities, belonging to that divine part but being on the lowest edge of the intelligible, and, having a common boundary with the perceptible nature, gives something to it of what it has in itself and receives something from it in return, if it does not use only its safe part in governing the universe, but with greater eagerness plunges into the interior and does not stay whole with whole.”32 In Plotinian terms, to explain a costly notion
- EnneadVI, 7, 14: “Dans la figure unique de l’Intelligence qui est comme une enceinte se trouvent des enceintes intérieures qui limitent d’autres figures; il s’y trouve des puissances, des pensées et une subdivision qui ne va pas en ligne droite mais la divide intérieurement, comme un animal universel qui comprend d’autres animaux puis d’autres encore jusqu’aux animaux et aux puissances qui ont le moins d’extension, c’està-dire jusqu’à l’espèce indivisible où elle s’arrête.”
[Plotinus Ennead 6.7.14, trans. Armstrong, 133.—Trans.] - Principal texts: a) in general: Enneads IV, 3, 4, 5. b) definition: I, 8, 14; III, 4, 3; IV, 6, 31; IV, 8, 7; IV, 8, 3; VI, 7, 35. c) analysis: III, 8, 5; IV, 3, 4, 9; IV, 9. d) relation between World Soul and individual souls: III, 1, 14; IV, 3, 5, and 6; IV, 3, 12; IV, 3, 17; IV, 8, 6; IV, 9, 8; VI, 1, 2; V, 2, 7; VI, 4, 16; VI, 5, 7; VI, 1, 7.
- Ennead IV, 8, 7: “C’est qu’elle occupe dans les êtres un rang intermédiaire; elle a une portion d’elle-même qui est divisée: mais placée à l’extrémité des êtres intelligibles et aux confins de la nature sensible, elle lui donne quelque chose d’elle-même. Elle reçoit en échange quelque chose de cette nature, si elle ne l’organise pas en restant elle-même en sûreté et si par trop d’ardeur elle se plonge en elle sans rester en entier en elle-même.” [Plotinus Ennead 4.8.7, trans. Armstrong, 419.—Trans.]
amounts to circumscribing the exact place where it is inserted into the current of the hypostases. This text explains clearly the first aspect of the soul, heir of the intelligible world in its superior part, and dipping its lower extremity into the sensible world. But at the same time the religious content of this conception appears, and we see how the soul, a metaphysical principle, could be equally able to serve as a basis for a theory of the fall or of original sin.
This World Soul defines all that lives, in the style of the Animal of the Stoic world. But at the same time, it is also the intelligible world and more and more divided and fragmented (as the latter marks already the dispersion of the One). It is therefore the intermediary between the sensible world and the intelligible world. In its relations with the intelligible world there are few difficulties. Intelligence produces the Soul as the One has engendered Intelligence itself.33 But if it is true that the World Soul is dispersed in the sensible world, if it is true that individual souls are parts of the World Soul that are given to play, in their respective spheres, the role that the World Soul itself maintains in the theater of the world,34 how can these parts and this whole be reconciled? And this continuity of principles and Beings that gives all its meaning to the Plotinian doctrine, how will it be maintained? A new problem arises regarding the soul just as one arose for the first two hypostases.
1) Plotinus has considered this hypostasis as particularly important, seeing that he devotes to it especially three treatises of EnneadIV.35Again the most sure way for us to proceed is to refer to these treatises. They envisage two problems: the relations of the World Soul to individual souls, and the relation of the human soul to its body. The latter relation, which deals particularly with psychology, will be studied in its turn and will serve as a completely natural transition to our study of conversion.
In the ninth treatise of Ennead IV, Plotinus demonstrates the fundamental unity of souls and their liaison with the force that animates the world. To tell the truth, above all he gives them an image. He represents this unity as that of a seminal reason encompassing all bodily organs or defines it as a science encompassing potentially all its theorems.36 But this being established, there arises the question of the production of individual souls.
- Ennead V, 4, 2.
- Ennead III, 2, 3.
- Ennead IV, 3, 4, 5: “On Difficulties about the Soul.”
- Ennead IV, 9, 5.
Plotinus’s solution is, as always, less a reason than a sentiment of which he attempts to provide the equivalent in an image— a solution already utilized for the One and Intelligence, and the essence of which, according to Breheir, comes down to “the affirmation of a unity between souls that are not a confusion and the affirmation of a confusion that is not a division.”37 Here again the image of light intervenes.38
Or consider this further image: “So it is also in All, to whatever it reaches; it is in one part of a plant and also in another, even if it is cut off; so that it is in the original plant and the part cut off from it: for the body of the all is one, and soul is everywhere in it as in one thing.”39 How, then, does Plotinus explain the differences between individual souls? “It is that they do not have the same relation to the intelligible. They are more or less opaque. And this lesser transparency, which renders them different on the path of the procession, organizes them into a hierarchy on the path of conversion. In this connection the explanation by contemplation forcefully intervenes.”40“[It was said that all souls are all things, but each is differentiated according to that which is active in it: that is, by] one being united in actuality, one being in a state of knowledge, one in a state of desire, and in that different souls look at different things and are and become what they look at.”41
2) To sum up, the complete unity of souls is a unity of convergence by which they all participate in the same living reality. Their multiplicity is that of a spiritual life that is obscured little by little up to the dispersion of its parts. It is a loosening that brings to the fore the particularities of
- Preface to Ennead IV, 3, p.
