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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Latin Page · Branch 89 of 174
Book II · Chapter 10 · §§ 10–12
Latin
p. 180Hoc vero nihil est aliud quam ipsam per se porrigi et sibimet penitus adaequari. Non ergo finit se infinitus Deus, cum se modo infinito inspicit infinitum. Immo suam confirmat infinitatem. Neque absurdum est Deum innumerabilia cernere. Non enim cernit ea gradatim enumerando, sed intuendo summatim. Et sicut plura videt tamquam unum, dum illa per unam speciem actu unico speculatur, sic infinitam multitudinem videt tamquam finitam, id est, tamquam rem quandam essentia omnino simplicem, sed quodammodo ratione multiplicem.
Quia formam suam revera unam, vigore et respectu quodam considerat omniformem.
Perinde ac si solis lux, colorum fons omnium, quae, ut ita loquar, unicolor est, se tamquam omnicolorem percipiat.
Marsilio Ficino’s Platonic Theology, Volume I: Book II
p. 181That, however, is nothing other than for it to extend through itself and be wholly commensurate with itself. Thus the infinite God does not limit himself when in an infinite mode he beholds himself as infinite; rather, he confirms his own infinity. Nor is it absurd for God to see innumerable things. For he does not see them gradually by enumerating them, but collectively by intuition. And just as he sees many things as one when he contemplates them through one form in a single act, so he sees an infinite multitude as finite—that is, as a thing wholly simple in essence but in some manner multiple according to reason.
For he regards his form, which is truly one, as containing every form by its power and in a certain respect.
It is just as though the light of the sun—the source of all colors, and itself, so to speak, of one color—perceived itself as bearing every color.
Socrates
Reading Marsilio Ficino’s Platonic Theology, Volume I · Book II · II.10.10–II.10.12
Ask about a concept, passage, contradiction, or connection.
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.