Platonism in English poetry of the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries

Plato · en
The Platonic theory of beauty teaches that the beauty of the body is a
result of the formative energy of the soul. According to Ficino, the
soul has descended from heaven and has framed a body in which to dwell.
Before its descent it conceives a certain plan for the forming of a
body; and if on earth it finds material favorable for its work and
sufficiently plastic, its earthly body is very similar to its celestial
one, hence it is beautiful. (VI. 6.) In Spenser this conception
underlies his account of the descent of the soul from God to earth.

           “For when the soule, the which derived was
           At first, out of that great immortall Spright,
           By whom all live to love, whilome did pas
           Downe from the top of purest heavens hight,
           To be embodied here, it then tooke light
           And lively spirits from that fayrest starre,
           Which lights the world forth from his firie carre.

           “Which powre retayning still or more or lesse,
           When she in fleshly seede is eft enraced,
           Through every part she doth the same impresse,
           According as the heavens have her graced,
           And frames her house, in which she will be placed,
           Fit for her selfe, adorning it with spoyle
           Of th’ heavenly riches, which she robd erewhyle.

                  ·       ·       ·       ·       ·

           “So every spirit, as it is most pure,
           And hath in it the more of heavenly light,
           So it the fairer bodie doth procure
           To habit in, and it more fairely dight
           With chearefull grace and amiable sight.
           For of the soule the bodie forme doth take:
           For soul is forme, and doth the bodie make.”

           (ll. 109–136.)

The obvious objection which one might make to this theory, that it does
not cover the whole ground inasmuch as it could never account for the
fact of the existence of a good soul in any but a beautiful form, was
answered by the further explanation that when the matter of which the
soul makes its body is unyielding, the soul must content itself with a
less beautiful form. (Ficino, VI. 6.) Thus Spenser adds:

            “Yet oft it falles, that many a gentle mynd
            Dwels in deformed tabernacle drownd,
            Either by chaunce, against the course of kynd,
            Or through unaptnesse in the substance sownd,
            Which it assumed of some stubborne grownd,
            That will not yield unto her formes direction,
            But is perform’d with some foule imperfection.”

            (ll. 144–150.)