Select Works of Plotinus — trans. Thomas Taylor
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f them to be oppositely assumed, and according to analogy, so that the soul [after a manner] possessing these, does not [really] possess them, and being passive to them does not suffer. And it must be considered what the mode is of such like affections.
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II. In the first place however, it is requisite to speak of virtue and vice, and to show what then takes place when vice is said to be present with the soul. For we say it is necessary to take away something, as if a certain evil was in the soul, and that virtue should be inserted in it, and it should be adorned and made beautiful, instead of being,p. 125 as it was before, base and deformed. If therefore we should say that virtue is harmony, but vice dis¬ sonance, shall we adduce an opinion conformable to that of the ancients ? For this assertion will in no small degree promote the object of our investi¬ gation. For if, indeed, virtue consists in the parts of the soul being naturally concordant with each other, but vice, in their not being concordant, nothing adventitious or extraneous will take place ; but each part will proceed such as it is, into an appropriate order, and being such will not enter into dissonance, like dancers who in dancing do not accord with each other ; either one of them singing, when the rest do not sing, or each singing by him¬ self. For it is not only necessary that they should sing together, but that each should sing well with an appropriate music, as far as pertains to his own part of the performance ; so that then also in the soul there is harmony, when each part performs that which is adapted to it. It is requisite, howr~ ever, prior to the harmony, that there should be another virtue of each of the parts, and another vice of each prior to their dissonance with respect to each other. What is it therefore, from which being present, each part is evil ? Is it from vicep. 126 being present? And again* is each part good through the presence of virtue ? Perhaps, therefore, some one may say that ignorance in the reasoning power is the vice of it, this ignorance consisting in the negation of knowledge, and not in the presence of a certain thing. But when false opinions are inherent, which especially produce vice, how is it possible in this case that something should not be ingenerated, and that this part of the soul should not thus be changed in quality ? Is not also the irascible part affected in one way when it is timid, and in another when it is brave ? And is not the epithymetic 1 part likewise, affected differently when it is intemperate, and when rt of the soul should not thus be changed in quality ? Is not also the irascible part affected in one way when it is timid, and in another when it is brave ? And is not the epithymetic 1 part likewise, affected differently when it is intemperate, and when it is temperate ? Or may we not say, that when each part possessing virtue, energizes according to the essence by which it is characterized, we then say it is obedient to reason ? And the reasoning part, indeed, is obedient to intellect, but the other parts to reason. Or shall we say that to be obedient to reason is as it were to see, that which is obedient not being figured,
1 i. e. The part characterized by desire ; the whole soul receiving a triple division, into reason, anger, and desire, which last is a tendency to the possession and enjoyment of external good.
p. 127
but seeing, and being in energy when it sees ; just as sight both when it is in capacity, and when in energy, is the same in essence ; but energy is not a change in quality, but at once applies itself to that to which it is essentially adapted, and perceives
* and knows without passivity. The reasoning power also thus subsists with reference to intellect, and thus sees. And the power of intellection is this, not becoming internally, the impressions as it were of a seal, but it possesses, and again does not pos¬ sess that which it sees. It possesses the spectacle indeed, in consequence of knowing it ; but does
* not possess it, because nothing is impressed in it from the object of vision, like the figure in the wax. It is, however, necessary to recollect, that memory is not a certain repository of impressions , but a power of the soul exciting itself in such a way as to possess that which it had not .
What then, was it not one thing before it thus recollected, and another afterwards when it now recollects ? [It was] if you are willing to call it another, and not to say that it is changed in qua- %; unless some one should assert that a progres¬ sion from power to energy is a mutation in quality. Nothing however is here added, but that is effectedp. 128 which there was a natural aptitude to effect. For in short, the energies of immaterial natures are not themselves in energizing changed in quality, or they would perish, but they much rather energize by remaining permanent. But to energize with passi¬ vity is the province of things which are connected in their energies with matter.
es of immaterial natures are not themselves in energizing changed in quality, or they would perish, but they much rather energize by remaining permanent. But to energize with passi¬ vity is the province of things which are connected in their energies with matter. If however that which is immaterial is passively affected, it will not be able any where to abide, as in the sight, vision energizing, it is the eye which suffers [and not the energy of seeing.] And opinions are as it were visions. But how7 is the irascible part timid ? And how also does it possess fortitude ? Shall we sav it is timid indeed, either because it does not look to reason, or because it looks to depraved rea¬ son ; or that it is so through a defect of instru¬ ments, such as the want or the weakness of corpo¬ real arms, in consequence of which it is either pre¬ vented from energizing, or is not moved so as to be as it were incited ? But it possesses fortitude, if the contrary takes place ; in neither of w hich cases, there is not any change of quality, or passion. Again, that part of the soul w hich desires, when it energizes alone, produces what is called intem¬ perance. For [sometimes] it performs all thingsp. 129 alone, other things not being present, whose pro¬ vince it is in their turn to have dominion, and to point out to this part [what it ought to do.] In the mean time the power whose province it is to see, performs something else, and not all things ; but is elsewhere at leisure, in consequence of seeing as much as possible other things. Perhaps, too, what is called the vice of this part, consists very much in a bad habit of the body ; but the virtue of it is a contrary habit; so that no addition is in either case made to the soul.
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III. But how is it that familiarities and aliena¬ tions, pains, anger, and pleasures, desires and fears, are not mutations and passions inherent and ex¬ citing? It is necessary, therefore, thus to distin¬ guish concerning these. For not to acknowledge that changes in quality are ingenerated in us, and also vehement sensations of these, is the province of one who denies things that are evident. It is requisite, therefore, admitting the subsistence of these, that we should investigate what that is which is changed. For by asserting that these things take place about the soul, we are in danger of falling into the same absurdity as if we should admit that Plot .