I, 7, 5. The Valentinians conceive of three kinds of men: the pneumatic [or spiritual], the choic [or material],(45) and the psychic [or animal]; such were Cain, Abel, and Seth. These three natures are no longer in one person, but in the race. The material goes to destruction. The animal, if it chooses the better part, finds repose in an intermediate place; but if it chooses the worse, it, too, goes to the same [destruction]. But they assert that the spiritual principles, whatever Acamoth has sown, being disciplined and nourished here from that time until now in righteous souls, because they were sent forth weak, at last attain perfection and shall be given as brides(46) to the angels of the Saviour, but their animal souls necessarily rest forever with the Demiurge in the intermediate place. And again subdividing the animal souls themselves, they say that some are by nature good and others are by nature evil. The good are those who become capable of receiving the seed; the evil by nature, those who are never able to receive that seed. I, 8, 23. The parable of the leaven which the woman is said to have hid in three measures of meal they declare manifests the three kinds of men: pneumatic, psychic, and the choic, but the leaven denoted the Saviour himself. Paul also very plainly set forth the choic, the psychic, and the pneumatic, saying in one place: “As is the earthy [choic] such are they also that are earthy” [I Cor. 15:48]; and in another place, “He that is spiritual [pneumatic] judgeth all things” [I Cor. 2:14]. And the passage, “The animal man receiveth not the things of the spirit” [I Cor. 2:15], they affirm was spoken concerning the Demiurge, who, being psychic, knew neither his mother, who was spiritual, nor her seed, nor the Eons in the pleroma. (_f_) Irenæus. _Adv. Hær._, I, 1. (MSG, 7:445 _f._) The following passage appears, from the context, to have been written with the teaching of Ptolemæus especially in mind. It should be compared with the account further on in the same book, I, 11: 1-3. The syzygies are characteristic of the Valentinian teaching, and the symbolism of marriage plays an important part in the “system” of all the Valentinians. In the words of Duchesne (_Hist. ancienne de l’église_, sixth ed., p. 171): “Valentinian Gnosticism is from one end to the other a ‘marriage Gnosticism.’ From the most abstract origins of being to their end, there are only syzygies, marriages, and generations.” For the connection between these conceptions and antinomianism, see Irenæus, _Adv. Hær._, I, 6:3 _f._ For their sacramental application, _ibid._, I, 21:3. _Cf._ I, 13:3, a passage which seems to belong to the sacrament of the bridal chamber.