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 162 of 174
Book IV · Chapter 1 · §§ 85–87
Latin
p. 326Denique caelum ab intelligentia quadam moveri id quoque nobis argumento est, quod caeli corpus motibus suis ita ordinat elementa disponitque composita, ut animae intellectuales compositis corporibus infundantur. Hae vero corporibus caelestibus valde praestantiores sunt. Corporea igitur natura caeli cum per se supra speciem suam neque agat quicquam neque disponat, certe in hac ipsa actione dispositioneque, ubi ad speciem mentis perfectae conducit, a mente divina tamquam instrumentum ab artifice ducitur. Quae quidem mens animae suae inest, quandoquidem praestantissimi corporis anima praestantissima est animarum.
Tres sunt praecipui, ut magi putant, principes super mundum: Oromasis, Mitris, Arimanis, id est Deus, mens, anima. Dei proprium est unitas, mentis ordo, animae motus. A Deo solo prima ipsa fit in mundo unitas partium et totius. A mente virtute Dei fit ordo partium unitarum. Ab anima superiorum virtute fit motus operis ordinati. Movet anima mundum mutabiliter per se ipsam. Movet ordinate per mentem. Perseverat semper in uno hoc officio per unitatem Dei ipsius aeternam. Sic illorum trium principum tria haec, ut dixi, in mundo videntur vestigia, quod Plato noster in epistola ad regem Dionysium videtur tetigisse, quem locum in libro de amore latius declaravimus. Mitto quod quaelibet species naturalis a Deo habet ut sit unaque sit, a mente ordinem, ab utroque perpetuitatem.
Sed ab anima caeloque habet ut rursus multiplex per singula sit atque mutabilis. Mens enim et anima quoniam a causa omnino immobili per ipsius substantiam proxime procreantur, substantia immutabiles prorsus evadunt. Naturales autem species quoniam a stabilibus causis, id est Deo et mente, per causas actione mobiles, id est animas caelosque, manent, etiam substantia quodammodo sunt mutabiles, quamvis causarum stabilium munere per continuam singulorum successionem perpetuae videantur. Unde enim mobiles causae motionis perpetuitatem habent, inde et harum effectus continuam generationis successionem.
Marsilio Ficino’s Platonic Theology, Volume I: Book IV
p. 327Finally, we have this further proof that heaven is moved by an intelligence: through its motions heaven's body so orders the elements and arranges composite things that intellectual souls are infused into composite bodies. Yet those souls far excel the heavenly bodies. Since the corporeal nature of heaven can neither act nor arrange anything beyond its own form by itself, in this very action and arrangement—where it conduces to the formation of a perfect mind—it is surely directed by the divine mind as an instrument by an artisan. That mind dwells within heaven's own soul, for the soul of the most excellent body is the most excellent of souls.
There are, as the Magi hold, three principal rulers above the world: Oromasis, Mitris, and Arimanis—that is, God, mind, and soul. Unity belongs properly to God, order to mind, and motion to soul. From God alone comes the world's primal unity of parts and whole. From mind, through God's power, comes the order of the united parts. From soul, through the power of higher things, comes the motion of the ordered work. Soul moves the world changeably through itself, moves it in order through mind, and perseveres forever in this one office through the eternal unity of God himself. Thus, as I have said, these three traces of those three rulers are seen in the world—a point our Plato seems to have touched upon in his letter to King Dionysius, a passage we explained more fully in our book on love. I pass over the fact that every natural species receives from God both its being and its unity, from mind its order, and from both its perpetuity.
From soul and heaven, however, a natural species receives in turn its multiplicity among individuals and its mutability. Mind and soul, because they are proximately brought forth in their substance by a wholly immutable cause, become utterly immutable in substance. Natural species, however, subsist from stable causes—God and mind—through causes mutable in their activity—souls and the heavens. They are therefore in some measure mutable even in substance, although by the gift of their stable causes they appear perpetual through the unbroken succession of individuals. From the same source, then, from which mobile causes receive perpetuity of motion, their effects receive the continual succession of generation.
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Reading Marsilio Ficino’s Platonic Theology, Volume I · Book IV · IV.1.85–IV.1.87
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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.