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 155 of 174
Book IV · Chapter 1 · §§ 58–61
Latin
p. 312Item cum corpus nihil per naturam agat suam, sed per qualitatem, et qualitas non suo ductu vim praestet corpori, sed quatenus ipsa aliunde movetur, si qualitas aliqua movet caelum, ipsa interim aliunde movetur.
Quid illud est quod ipsam movet? Deusne? Minime. Nam prima causa, cum infinite excedat omnia, nulli corpori familiaris est, sed aeque omnibus est communis et ab omnibus absoluta. Si enim Deus esset proprius alicuius corporis agitator, non esset amplius omnium. Ideo ut sit omnium, non est rector proprius alicuius. Sphaerae tamen familiarissimos, ut diximus, motores requirunt. Ac etiam quia discretae sunt invicem et diversis motibus agitantur, alios atque alios motores proprios exigunt, quandoquidem esse debet inter motorem motumque proportio. Neque probanda est eorum sententia qui motores sphaeris ita distribuunt, ut Deus primae accommodetur, reliquis reliqui intellectus. Nam cum secundum proportionem distributio fiat, sicut sphaerae in natura ordineque conveniunt invicem, ita invicem congruent Deus et intellectus. Non superabit Deus reliquos intellectus nisi quantum prima sphaera superat reliquas, nec erit immensus.
Erit quoque compositus ex natura communi qua cum aliis congruet, atque ex propria per quam distinguetur.
Praeterea si Deus ipsa bonitas est, haec autem rem quamlibet movet tamquam appetibile appetitum, Deus caelum movet tamquam finis. Corpus autem ad finem extrinsecum non movetur nisi per interiorem aliquam formam, finis quidem ipsius cupidam effectricemque motionis. Ergo inest caelo forma bonitatis primae cupida, effectrixque motus.
Marsilio Ficino’s Platonic Theology, Volume I: Book IV
p. 313Again, a body does nothing through its own nature but acts through quality, and quality supplies power to the body not under its own direction but insofar as it is itself moved from elsewhere. If, then, some quality moves heaven, that quality is in turn moved from elsewhere.
What is it that moves the quality itself? God? By no means. The first cause, since it infinitely transcends all things, is not intimately joined to any body; it is equally common to all and free from all. If God were the particular mover of some body, he would no longer belong to all things. In order to be the God of all, therefore, he is not the particular ruler of any one body. The spheres nevertheless require, as we have said, movers most intimately joined to them. And because the spheres are distinct from one another and are driven by different motions, they require different proper movers, since there must be a proportion between mover and moved. Nor should we approve the view of those who distribute movers among the spheres in such a way that God is assigned to the first and the remaining intellects to the remaining spheres. Since the distribution is made according to proportion, just as the spheres agree with one another in nature and order, so God and the intellects will agree with one another. God will surpass the remaining intellects only as much as the first sphere surpasses the others, and he will not be immeasurable.
He will also be composite: from a common nature by which he agrees with the others, and from a proper nature by which he is distinguished from them.
Moreover, if God is goodness itself, and goodness moves every thing as an object of desire moves appetite, then God moves heaven as its end. A body, however, is not moved toward an external end except through some interior form that desires that end and produces the motion. There is therefore present in heaven a form that desires the first goodness and produces its motion.
Socrates
Reading Marsilio Ficino’s Platonic Theology, Volume I · Book IV · IV.1.58–IV.1.61
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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.