Select Works of Plotinus — trans. Thomas Taylor

as cited by Becher in his Physica Subterranea, p. 319. 4to. For his words are, “ Non dari rem elementatam, in cujus ultima substantiatione non reperiatur aurum.’’ That all metals, likewise, may be analyzed into water, is the doctrine both of Plato and Aristotle. See my translation of the Timaeus of the former, and Meteors of the latter.

p. 39

VII. Empedocles, however, who substitutes the elements for matter, has the corruption of them testifying against him. But Anaxagoras, who makes the mixture of things to be matter, and who says, that it has not an aptitude to [become] all things, but has all things in energy, subverts the intellect which he introduces ; not assigning to it the production of morphe and form, nor asserting that it is prior to matter, but that it subsists in conjunction with it. It is, however, impossible that intellect and matter should be consubsistent. For if the mixture participates of being, it follows that being is prior to it. But if being also is a mixture, a certain third thing is wanting to these. If, therefore, it is necessary that the demiurgus should have a prior subsistence, why is it necessary that forms should be in matter according to parvitude ; and that afterwards intellect by a vainly laborious process should separate them from each other ? For it is possible to impress quality in mat¬ ter, since it is without quality, and to extend mor¬ phe through the whole of it. And, besides, is it not impossible that all things should be in every thing ? But he who asserts that the infinite is mat¬ ter, should explain what this infinite is. And if itp. 40 is infinite in such a way as that which cannot fie passed over, it must be observed, that there is not any such thing among beings, neither if it is the infinite itself, nor if it is inherent in another nature, as an accident to a certain body» It is not, in¬ deed, the infinite itself, because the part of it is necessarily infinite. Nor is it the infinite as an accident, because that to which it is an accident would not be of itself infinite, nor simple, and there¬ fore evidently would not be matter. But neither have atoms the order of matter, which indeed have no subsistence whatever/ For every body is en¬ tirely divisible. This opinion is also confuted from the continuity and moisture of bodies ; and also from the impossibility of things subsisting without intellect and soul, which could not be formed from atoms.

have no subsistence whatever/ For every body is en¬ tirely divisible. This opinion is also confuted from the continuity and moisture of bodies ; and also from the impossibility of things subsisting without intellect and soul, which could not be formed from atoms. Again, it is not possible to fabricate any other nature, besides atoms from atoms ; since no artificer is able to produce any thing from matter which is not continuous. Ten thousand other objections might and have been urged against this hypothesis, and therefore it i& superfluous to dwell longer on these particulars.

1 i. e. As things perfectly indivisible.

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VIII. What, then, is this nature, which is said to be one, continued, and void of quality ? And, indeed, that it is not a body if void of quality, is evident ; 1 for if it were, it would have quality.

1 Though from the arguments adduced here by Plotinus, it appears to be impossible that the first matter should be body void of quality, yet I think there will not be any absurdity in admitting with Simplicius, that body is twofold, one kind as subsisting according to form and productive power, and de¬ fined by certain intervals ; but another as characterized by intensions and remissions, and an indefiniteness of an incorpo¬ real, impartible, and intelligible nature; this not being form¬ ally defined by three intervals, but entirely remitted and dissi¬ pated, and on all sides flowing from being into non-being. “ Such an interval as this, we must perhaps,” (says Simplicius) %t admit matter to be, and not corporeal form, which now measures and bounds the infinite and indefinite nature of such an interval as this, and which stops it in its flight from being* Matter, however, is that by which material things differ from such as are immaterial. But they differ by bulk, interval, division, and things of this kind, and not by things which are defined according to measure, but by things void of measure and indefinite, and which are capable of being bounded by formal measures. The Pythagoreans appear to have been the first of the Greeks that had this suspicion concerning matter ; but after them Plato, as Moderatus also informs us. For he, conformably to the Pythagoreans, evinced that the first one is above being, and all essence ; but he says, that forms are the second one, which is true being and the intelligible ; and that the third one, which is psychical, or belonging to soul, parti¬ cipates of the one , and of forms.

evinced that the first one is above being, and all essence ; but he says, that forms are the second one, which is true being and the intelligible ; and that the third one, which is psychical, or belonging to soul, parti¬ cipates of the one , and of forms. He adds, that the last nature

p. 42

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But we say that it is the matter of all sensibles, and that it is not the matter of some, but the form of others ; as clay is matter to the potter, but is not simply matter. We do not, therefore, speak of it in this way, but with reference to ail things ; and this being the case, we must not attribute to the from this, and which is the nature of sensibles, does not parti¬ cipate them, but is adorned according to a representation of them, matter which is in them being the shadow of the non-being, which is primarily in quantity, or rather depending on and proceeding from it. According to this reasoning, there¬ fore, matter is nothing else than the mutation of sensibles, with respect to intelligibles, deviating from thence, and carried downwards to non-being.

Those things, indeed, which are the properties of sensibks are irrational, corporeal, distributed into parts, and passing into bulk and divulsion, through an ultimate progression into generation, viz, into matter; for matter is always truly the last sediment. Hence, also, the Egyptians call the dregs of the first life, which they symbolically deno¬ minate water, matter, being as it were a certain mire. And matter is, as it were, the receptacle of generated and sensible natures, not subsisting as any definite form, but as the state or condition of subsistence ; just as the impartible, the immate¬ rial, true being, and things of this kind, are the constitution of an intelligible nature ; all forms, indeed, subsisting both here and there, but here materially, and there immaterially ; viz. there impartibly and truly, but here partibly awd shadowy. Hence, every form is here distributed according to material interval.” See more on this subject in the notes to Book I. of my translation of Aristotle's Physics.

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nature of it any thing which is perceived among sensibles. Hence, besides not granting to it other qualities, such as colour, heat and cold, we must ascribe to it neither levity or gravity, neither density or rarity, or figure ; and therefore, neither must we ascribe to it magnitude. For magnitude itself is one thing, and to be great another. And figure itself is one thing, and that which is figured another.