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
But we shall have to explain more clearly the sense in which the word
"parts" must here be taken. To begin with, there is here no question of
parts of a body, whether homogeneous or heterogeneous. We shall make
but a single observation, namely, that when treating of homogeneous
bodies, parts refer to mass, and not to form. For instance, take
whiteness. The whiteness of one part of the milk, is not a part of the
whiteness of all the milk in existence; it is the whiteness of a part,
and not the part of whiteness; for, taken in general, whiteness has
neither size nor quantity. Only with these restrictions can we say that
there are parts in the forms suitable to corporeal things.
WHEN APPLIED TO INCORPOREAL THINGS, "PARTS" HAVE DIFFERENT SENSES.
Further, treating of incorporeal things, "parts" is taken in several
senses. Speaking of numbers, we may say that two is a part of ten
(referring exclusively to abstract numbers). We may also say that a
certain extension is a part of a circle or line. Further, a notion is
said to be a part of science.
SUCH MATHEMATICAL SENSES CANNOT BE APPLIED TO THE SOUL.
When dealing with numbers and geometrical figures, as well as with
bodies, it is evident that the whole is necessarily diminished by its
division into parts, and that each part is smaller than the whole.
Rightly, these things should be susceptible to increase or diminution,
as their nature is that of definite quantities, not quantity in itself.
It is surely not in this sense that, when referring to the soul, we
speak of quantities. The soul is not a quantity such as a "dozen,"
which forms a whole divisible into unities; otherwise, we would end in
a host of absurdities, since a group of ten is not a genuine unity.
Either each one of the unities would have to be soul, or the Soul
herself result from a sum of inanimate unities.
ACTUAL DIVISION INTO PARTS WOULD BE TANTAMOUNT TO A DENIAL OF THE WHOLE.
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