The six books of Proclus, the Platonic successor, on the theology of Plato (vol. 2 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 p
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From the celestial choir of Gods likewise, a certain order proceeds
into generation, which, as the divine Jamblichus says, is doubled in
its progression. For from the twenty-one leaders, forty-two governments
of Gods who are the fabricators of generation, are derived, according
to each elementary allotment. But from the thirty-six decadarchs,[163]
seventy-two sublunary rulers proceed; and in a similar manner other
Gods; being the double of the celestial Gods in multitude, but falling
short of them in power. It is likewise necessary to survey their triple
progressions, their quintuple divisions, and their divine generation
according to the hebdomad. For they receive an orderly distribution in
a three-fold, five-fold, and sevenfold manner analogous to the whole
world; in order that each of the elements may be a world, and may be
truly an imitation of the universe. Such, therefore, is the concise
doctrine concerning the sublunary Gods, according to twofold essences,
lives, and allotments; just as Plato also makes the ruling progeny of
them to be dyadic.
CHAPTER XXXIII.
Having therefore discussed the theory pertaining to the celestial and
sublunary Gods, it now remains that we ascend to the summit or monad
of all the mundane Gods, Bacchus, in whose divinity they all subsist
and are rooted, similarly to the fixed stars in the inerratic sphere.
For after this manner, every monad analogously contains its co-ordinate
multitude.
Bacchus therefore, is the mundane intellect, from which the soul and
body of the world are suspended. With respect however, to intellect
it is necessary to observe that one kind is imparticipable and total;
another is participable indeed but essentially so; and a third is
participable, and subsists as a habit. All intellects unconnected
with soul belong to the first kind. The mundane intellect, and the
intellects of all the mundane Gods and beneficent dæmons, rank in the
second division. And to the third class such intellects as ours belong.
This deity also is the monad of the Titans, or ultimate fabricators
of things, by whom he is said in divine fables to have been torn in
pieces; because the mundane soul which participates of this divinity,
and is on this account intellectual, is participated by the Titans,
and through them distributed into every part of the universe. Plato
in the Cratylus says of this divinity “that he is the giver of wine;
and that οινος _wine_ may most justly be denominated οιονους because
it is accustomed to deprive those of intellect who possessed it
before.” On which words Proclus in his MS Scholia on that dialogue
observes as follows: “The young man Cratylus appears to inquire about
our sovereign master Bacchus, as if it were about things of small
importance, and on this account he is silenced by Socrates.[164] And
he does not indeed pay attention to the occult, but only to the last
and mundane progressions of the Gods.” These indeed, the wise man