The six books of Proclus, the Platonic successor, on the theology of Plato (vol. 1 of 2) : $b translated from the Greek, to which a seventh book is added, in order to supply the deficiency of another book on this subject, which was written by Proclus, but since lost, also, a translation from the Greek of Proclus' Elements of theology, to which are added a translation of the treatise of Proclus, On providence and fate, a translation of extracts from his treatise, entitled, Ten doubts concerning
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Again, therefore, let us discuss this affair in another way, and view
with the dianoëtic power, where any thing futile is delivered. For let
it be said, if you please, and we will first of all allow it, that the
conclusions of this second hypothesis are about true being. But as
this is multitude, and, not only one itself, like _the one_ prior to
beings; for being is that which is passive to _the one_, as the Elean
guest in the Sophista informs us; and as it is universally acknowledged
by our opponents, who establish that which is first as _the one_, but
intellect, as _one many_, soul, as _one and many_, and body, as _many
and one_:--as therefore, this has been asserted a thousand times, I
mean that in true being there is multitude together with union, whether
will they say that these things harmonize with the whole of being, but
not with its parts, or both with the whole and its parts? And again, we
ask them, whether they attribute all things to each part of being, or
whether they ascribe different things to different parts?
If, therefore, they are of opinion, that each particular should alone
harmonize with the whole of being, being will consist of non-beings,
that which is moved, of things immoveable, that which abides, of things
deprived of permanency, and universally, all things will consist of
their opposites, and we shall no longer agree with the discourse of
Parmenides, who says that the parts of _being characterized by the
one_, are in a certain respect wholes, and that each of them is one
and being, in a manner similar to the whole. But if we attribute all
things to each part, and there is nothing which we do not make all
things, how can the summit of being, and that which is most eminently
one, contain a wholeness, and an incomprehensible multitude of parts?
How can it at one and the same time contain the whole of number,
figure, motion and permanency, and in short all forms and genera? For
these differ from each other, and the hypothesis will assert things
impossible. For things near to, will be similarly multiplied with
things remote from _the one_, and that which is first, will not be
a less multitude than that which is last; nor again, will the last of
things be a less one than the first, and things in the middle will have
no difference with respect to division from the extremes.