Plotinos · Plotinus
INTELLIGIBLE MATTER IS NOT SHAPELESS.
3. To this it may first be answered that the indeterminate should not be scorned everywhere, nor that which is conceived of as shapeless, even if this be the substrate of the higher and better entities; for we might call even the soul indeterminate, in respect to intelligence and reason, which give it a better shape and nature. Besides, when we say that intelligible things are composite (of matter and form), this is not in the sense in which the word is used of bodies. Even reasons would thus be called composite, and by their actualization form another alleged composite, nature, which aspires to form. If, in the intelligible world, the composite tend toward some other principle, or depend thereon, the difference between this composite and bodies is still better marked. Besides, the matter of begotten things ceaselessly changes form, while the matter of the intelligible entities ever remains identical. Further, matter here below is subject to other conditions (than in the intelligible world). Here below, indeed, matter is all things only partly, and is all things only successively; consequently, amidst these perpetual changes nothing is identical, nothing is permanent. Above, on the contrary, matter is all things simultaneously, and possessing all things, could not transform itself. Consequently, matter is never shapeless above; for it is not even shapeless here below. Only the one (intelligible matter) is situated differently from the other (sense-matter). Whether, however, (intelligible matter) be begotten, or be eternal, is a question that cannot be determined until we know what it is.
THE NATURE OF IDEAS IMPLIES AN INDIVIDUAL FORM, WHICH AGAIN IMPLIES A SUBSTRATE. 4. Granting now the existence of ideas, whose reality has been demonstrated elsewhere,[283] we must draw their legitimate consequences. Necessarily ideas have something in common, inasmuch as they are manifold; and since they differ from each other, they must also have something individual. Now the individuality of any idea, the difference that distinguishes it from any other, consists of its particular shape. But form, to be received, implies a substrate, that might be determined by the difference. There is therefore always a matter that receives form, and there is always a substrate (even in ideas, whose matter is genus, and whose form is its difference). RELYING ON THE PUN BETWEEN WORLD AND ADORNMENT, PLOTINOS CONCLUDES THAT IF THE INTELLIGIBLE WORLD BE THE IMAGE OF THIS, IT MUST ALSO BE A COMPOSITE OF FORM AND MATTER.
Besides, our world is an image of the intelligible world. Now as our world is a composite of matter (and form), there must be matter also on high (that is, in the intelligible world). Otherwise, how could we call the intelligible world "kosmos" (that is, either world, or adornment), unless we see matter (receiving) form therein? How could we find form there, without (a residence) that should receive it? That world is indivisible, taken in an absolute sense; but in a relative sense, is it divisible? Now if its parts be distinct from each other, their division or distinction is a passive modification of matter; for what can be divided, must be matter. If the multitude of ideals constitute an indivisible being, this multitude, which resides in a single being, has this single being as substrate, that is, as matter and is its shapes. This single, yet varied substrate conceives of itself as shapeless, before conceiving of itself as varied. If then by thought you abstract from it variety, forms, reasons, and intelligible characteristics, that which is prior is indeterminate and shapeless; then there will remain in this (subject) none of the things that are in it and with it. THE BOTTOM OF EVERYTHING IS MATTER, WHICH IS RELATIVE DARKNESS.
5. If, we were to conclude that there were no matter in intelligible entities, because they were immutable, and because, in them, matter is always combined with (shape), we would be logically compelled to deny the existence of matter in bodies; for the matter of bodies always has a form, and every body is always complete (containing a form and a matter). Each body, however, is none the less composite, and intelligence observes its doubleness; for it splits until it arrives to simplicity, namely, to that which can no longer be decomposed; it does not stop until it reaches the bottom things. Now the bottom of each thing is matter. Every matter is dark, because the reason (the form) is the light, and because intelligence is the reason.[284] When, in an object, intelligence considers the reason, it considers as dark that which is below reason, or light. Likewise, the eye, being luminous, and directing its gaze on light and on the colors which are kinds of light, considers what is beneath, and hidden by the colors, as dark and material. INTELLIGIBLE MATTER CONSISTS OF REAL BEING, ESPECIALLY AS SHAPED.
Besides, there is a great difference between the dark bottom of intelligible things and that of sense-objects; there is as much difference between the matter of the former and of the latter as there is between their form. The divine matter, on receiving the form that determines it, possesses an intellectual and determinate life. On the contrary, even when the matter of the bodies becomes something determinate, it is neither alive nor thinking; it is dead, in spite of its borrowed beauty.[285] As the shape (of sense-objects) is only an image, their substrate also is only an image. But as the shape (of intelligible entities) possesses veritable (reality), their substrate is of the same nature. We have, therefore, full justification for calling matter "being," that is, when referring to intelligible matter; for the substrate of intelligible entities really is "being," especially if conceived of together with its inherent (form). For "being" is the luminous totality (or complex of matter and form). To question the eternity of intelligible matter is tantamount to questioning that of ideas; indeed, intelligible entities are begotten in the sense that they have a principle; but they are non-begotten in the sense that their existence had no beginning, and that, from all eternity, they derive their existence from their principle. Therefore they do not resemble the things that are always becoming, as our world; but, like the intelligible world, they ever exist.
THE CATEGORIES OF MOVEMENT AND DIFFERENCE APPLIED TO INTELLIGIBLES. The difference that is in the intelligible world ever produces matter; for, in that world, it is the difference that is the principle of matter, as well as of primary motion. That is why the latter is also called difference, because difference and primary motion were born simultaneously.[286] The movement and difference, that proceed from the First (the Good), are indeterminate, and need it, to be determinate. Now they determine each other when they turn towards it. Formerly, matter was as indeterminate as difference; it was not good because it was not yet illuminated by the radiance of the First. Since the First is the source of all light, the object that receives light from the First does not always possess light; this object differs from light, and possesses light as something alien, because it derives light from some other source. That is the nature of matter as contained in intelligible (entities). Perhaps this treatment of the subject is longer than necessary. SUBSTRATE IS DEMANDED BY TRANSFORMATION OF ELEMENTS, BY THEIR DESTRUCTION AND DISSOLUTION.
6. Now let us speak of bodies. The mutual transformation of elements demonstrates that they must have a substrate. Their transformation is not a complete destruction; otherwise (a general) "being"[287] would perish in nonentity. Whereas, what is begotten would have passed from absolute nonentity to essence; and all change is no more than the passing of one form into another (as thought Aristotle).[288] It presupposes the existence of permanent (subject) which would receive the form of begotten things only after having lost the earlier form. This is demonstrated by destruction, which affects only something composite; therefore every dissolved object must have been a composite. Dissolution proves it also. For instance, where a vase is dissolved, the result is gold; on being dissolved, gold leaves water; and so analogy would suggest that the dissolution of water would result in something else, that is analogous to its nature. Finally, elements necessarily are either form, or primary matter, or the composites of form and matter. However, they cannot be form, because, without matter, they could not possess either mass nor magnitude. Nor can they be primary matter, because they are subject to destruction. They must therefore be composites of form and matter; form constituting their shape and quality, and matter a substrate that is indeterminate, because it is not a form.
Ideas discussed in this chapter
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