8. When the soul applies herself to carry out her proper function[217]--for the soul effects everything, as far as she plays the part of a principle--she follows the straight road;[218] when she loses her way[219] the divine justice subjugates her to the physical order which reigns in the universe,[220] unless the soul succeed in liberating herself. The divine justice[221] reigns ever, because the universe is directed by the order and power of the dominating principle (the universal Soul).[222] To this is joined the co-operation of the planets which are important parts of the heaven, either by embellishing it, or by serving as signs. Now they serve as signs for all things that occur in the sense-world. As to their potency, they should be credited only with what they effect indisputably. WEALTH, POVERTY, AND VICES ARE THE RESULT OF EXTERNAL CIRCUMSTANCES. As to us, we fill the functions of the soul in accordance with nature when we do not stray into the multiplicity contained in the universe. When we do stray therein, we are punished for it both by the straying itself, and by a less happy fate thereafter. Wealth and poverty, therefore, happen to us as effects of the operation of exterior things. As to the virtues and vices, virtues are derived from the primitive nature of the soul, while the vices result from dealings of the soul with exterior things. But this has been treated of elsewhere.[223] SIGNIFICANCE OF THE SPINDLE OF THE FATES. 9. This brings us to a consideration of the spindle, which, according to the ancients, is turned by the Fates, and by which Plato signifies[224] that which, in the evolution of the world, moves, and that which is immovable. According to (Plato), it is the Fates, and their mother Necessity, which turn this spindle, and which impress it with a rotary motion in the generation of each being. It is by this motion that begotten beings arrive at generation. In the Timaeus[225] the (Intelligence, or) divinity which has created the universe gives the (immortal) principle of the soul, (the reasonable soul), and the deities which revolve in the heaven add (to the immortal principle of the soul) the violent passions which subject us to Necessity, namely, angers, desires, sufferings, and pleasures; in short, they furnish us with that other kind of soul (the animal nature, or vegetable soul) from which they derive these passions. Plato thus seems to subject us to the stars, by hinting that we receive from them our souls,[227] subordinating to the sway of Necessity when we descend here below, both ourselves and our morals, and through these, the "actions" and "passions"[228] which are derived from the passional habit[215] of the soul (the animal nature).[229] WHICH OF OUR TWO SOULS IS THE GENUINE INDIVIDUALITY?