Diotimos Library · Renaissance Collection · Bilingual Edition
Marsilio Ficino’s Platonic Theology, Volume I
Proem and Books I–IV · Latin with an independent English translation
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Facing Pages · Branch 135 of 174
Book III · Chapter 2 · §§ 18–21
Latin
p. 272Quapropter est instar puncti alicuius in se ipso viventis et ab omni quantitate et situ penitus absoluti. Ideo ambit aeque omnem corporis situm, et quando corpus ingreditur, quia ipsa non est proprium quantitatis alicuius punctum, non adstringitur ad punctum aliquod corporeae quantitatis.
Quippe cum sit extra quantitatis genus, non determinatur ad tangendum punctum aliquod quantitatis, sed est ut centrum in lineis omnibus et circulo toto. Hinc etiam illud sequitur, ut haec essentia et dividua sit simul et individua. Dividua, quia per divisionem corporis vitalem sui umbram diffundit, dum diversis partibus corporis se communicat. Individua, quia integra simul adstat et simplex. Dividua, inquam, quia umbra eius in toto corpore est dividuo. Individua, quia ipsa per modum individuum est in qualibet corporis parte tota. Individua rursus, quoniam stabilem habet unitamque substantiam. Dividua, quoniam per operationem in plura dividitur, dum per motum operatur et tempus. Individua tertio, quia suspicit superiora, quae admodum sunt unita. Dividua, quia ad inferiora declinat, quae plurimum dividuntur.
Talis quaedam natura in ordine mundi videtur summopere necessaria, ut post Deum angelumque, qui neque secundum tempus neque secundum dimensionem dividui sunt, ac supra corpus et qualitates, quae tempore dimensioneque dissipantur, sit medium competens.
Quod temporali quidem discursione quodammodo dividatur, non tamen sit dimensione divisum. Neque rursus in sua quadam natura collectum maneat semper ut illi, neque in partes discerptatur ut ista, sed individuum sit pariter et dividuum.
Marsilio Ficino’s Platonic Theology, Volume I: Book III
p. 273It is therefore like a point alive in itself and wholly free from all quantity and position. For that reason it encompasses every position of the body equally; and when it enters a body, because it is not the particular point of any quantity, it is not bound to any point of bodily quantity.
For since it lies outside the genus of quantity, it is not confined to touching any quantitative point; rather, it is like the center in all the lines and in the whole circle. It follows from this that the essence is at once divisible and indivisible. Divisible, because through the body’s division it diffuses its vital shadow, communicating itself to the body’s different parts. Indivisible, because it stands present all at once, whole and simple. Divisible, I say, because its shadow is in the whole divisible body. Indivisible, because it is wholly present in every bodily part in an indivisible mode. Indivisible again, because it has a stable and unified substance. Divisible, because in operation it is divided among many things as it acts through motion and time. Indivisible for a third reason, because it looks upward toward higher things, which are highly unified. Divisible, because it inclines toward lower things, which are divided to the greatest degree.
A nature of this kind appears supremely necessary in the order of the world: below God and angel, who are divisible neither in time nor in extension, and above body and qualities, which are dispersed through time and extension, there must be a fitting middle.
Such a middle would in some manner be divided by temporal succession, yet not divided by spatial extension. It would neither remain forever gathered within a certain nature of its own, as the higher things do, nor be torn into parts, as the lower things are, but would be at once indivisible and divisible.
Socrates
Reading Marsilio Ficino’s Platonic Theology, Volume I · Book III · III.2.18–III.2.21
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Socrates will begin with this book and its sources.About This Reading Edition
Marsilio Ficino’s Platonic Theology places the immortality of the soul at the center of an extended philosophical ascent through body, soul, angel, and God. This exact page-aligned Renaissance edition presents the authorial Proem and Books I–IV in a newly established Latin reading text with an independent English translation prepared by Diotimos Editions.
Historical Text and Translation
The Latin reading text is based on the Florence editio princeps printed by Antonio Miscomini on 7 November 1482 and principally collated against the Paris 1559 printing, with a 1641 Opera printing used only as a late control and OCR aid. Abbreviations are expanded, spelling and punctuation are conservatively normalized, and substantive departures among the witnesses are documented in the edition’s apparatus.
About Diotimos Editions
Diotimos Editions prepared this independently worded English translation in house. It aims for a dignified but readable modern register while preserving Ficino’s argumentative sequence, metaphors, technical distinctions, repetitions, conditions, purpose clauses, and direct appeals; long periods are divided only where clarity requires it.
Rights
Ficino’s Latin source work is in the public domain. The 2026 English translation and Diotimos editorial matter are original to this edition and remain © 2026 Diotimos.