Plotinos: Complete Works, v. 2: In Chronological Order, Grouped in Four PeriodsPlotinus
Philosophy
Plotinos: Complete Works, v. 2: In Chronological Order, Grouped in Four Periods
Plotinus
Plotinus
It may again be objected that it is indeed the soul that remembers; but
only because she is resident in the body, and is not pure; she must be
affected in some particular manner to be able to impress the body with
the forms of sense-objects; her seat must be in the body to receive
these forms, and to preserve them. But to begin with, these forms
could not have any extension; then they could not be either (Stoic)
seal-imprints, or impressions; for in the soul there is no impulsion,
nor any imprint similar to that of a seal on wax, and the operation
itself by which it perceives sense-objects is a kind of thought
(or intellection). Indeed, it would be impossible to speak of an
impression in the act of thought. Thought has no need of the body or a
corporeal quality. It is besides necessary for the soul to remember her
movements, as for instance, her desires which have not been satisfied,
and whose object the body has not attained; for what could the body
tell us of an object which the body has not yet reached?[144] (Speaking
of thoughts), how could the soul, conjointly with the body, remember
things which the body, by its very nature, could absolutely not know?
MEMORY BELONGS TO THE SOUL ALONE.
Doubtless we will have to acknowledge that there are affections which
pass from the body into the soul; but there are also affections which
belong exclusively to the soul, because the soul is a real being, with
characteristic nature and activities. In this case, the soul must have
desires, and recall them, remembering that they have, or have not
been satisfied; because, by her nature, she does not form part of the
things which are (as Heraclitus said) in a perpetual flow. Otherwise,
we could not attribute to the soul coenesthesia (or, common feeling),
conscience, reflection, or the intuition of herself. If she did not
possess them by her nature, she would not acquire them by union with
the body. Doubtless there are activities which the soul cannot carry
out without the assistance of the organs; but she herself possesses the
faculties (or "powers") from which these activities are outgrowths.
Besides, she, by herself, possesses other faculties, whose operations
are derived from her alone. Among these is memory, whose exercise
is only hindered by the body. Indeed, when the soul unites with the
body, she forgets; when she separates from the body, and purifies
herself, she often recovers memory. Since the soul possesses memory
when she is alone, the body, with its changeable nature, that is ever
subject to a perpetual flow, is a cause of forgetfulness, and not of
memory; the body therefore is, for the soul, the stream of Lethe (or
forgetfulness). To the soul alone, therefore, belongs memory.
MEMORY BELONGS BOTH TO THE DIVINE SOUL, AND TO THAT DERIVED FROM THE
WORLD-SOUL.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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