Marsilio Ficino’s Platonic Theology, Volume II

Name: Marsilio Ficino’s Platonic Theology, Volume II
Author: Marsilio Ficino

Books V–VIII · Latin with an independent English translation

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Marsilio Ficino’s Platonic Theology, Volume IIBook VI · Chapter 4 · §§ 1–4

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Latin Page · Branch 88 of 191

Book VI · Chapter 4 · §§ 1–4

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Latin

p. 170

Prima ratio: quia anima est principium nutriendi et quomodocumque aliter operandi.

Animantes et plantae virentes corpora sunt. Corpora etiam sunt ligna et saxa ex terra convulsa. Corpora illa coalescunt. Haec vero nequaquam. Quid autem est in illis principium alimenti? Non materia corporalis, quoniam alia etiam corpora nutrirentur, quibus talis materia est communis.

Cum ergo vis illa per quam adolescunt aliud quiddam sit praeter materiam corporalem, et illa non sit aliud quam anima nutritiva, sequitur ut talis anima non sit corpus. Si quis autem obiecerit ita:

Immo vero est corpus, non corpus quodlibet, sed tale quiddam et sic affectum, qualis natura plantis et animantibus propria sit, saxis vero et lignis aridis non communis.

Quaeremus ab illo de huiusmodi tali certoque corpore quod vocat animam, utrum duo quaedam in se contineat, corporalem scilicet molem atque insuper certam quandam affectionem per quam tale vocatur et certum fit propriumque corpus, an nihil habeat ultra materiam corporibus omnibus ubique communem. Si nihil respondeatur habere praeter communem hanc molem, vana fuerat nimium obiectio illa per quam dicebatur non quodlibet corpus esse animam, sed corpus tale et certo modo dispositum. Non enim fit corpus tale et certo modo dispositum nisi per qualitatem ipsam et propriam quandam affectionem ipsi corpori superadditam, per quam non modo sit corpus sed et tale, per quam etiam a quolibet alio differat corpore.

Marsilio Ficino’s Platonic Theology, Volume II: Book VI

p. 171

First argument: because the soul is the principle of nourishment and of every other mode of action.

Living creatures and flourishing plants are bodies. Logs and stones torn from the earth are bodies as well. The former grow together; the latter do not. What, then, is the principle of nourishment in the former? It is not corporeal matter, for then other bodies, which share matter of this kind, would also be nourished.

Since, therefore, the power by which they grow is something other than corporeal matter, and since that power is nothing other than the nutritive soul, it follows that a soul of this kind is not a body. But someone may object as follows:

On the contrary, it is a body—not just any body, but a body of a certain kind and so disposed, with a nature proper to plants and living creatures but not shared by stones and dry wood.

We shall ask him whether this definite body of such a kind, which he calls soul, contains two things within itself: corporeal bulk, and besides it some definite condition by which it is called a body of such a kind and becomes a definite and proper body; or whether it possesses nothing beyond the matter common to all bodies everywhere. If his answer is that it possesses nothing beyond this common bulk, then the preceding objection was entirely futile: that not just any body is soul, but a body of such a kind and disposed in a definite way. For a body becomes such and is disposed in a definite way only through a quality itself and some proper condition superadded to the body, by which it is not merely a body but a body of such a kind, and by which it also differs from every other body.

315.The chapter opens at the directly inspected decorated M1482 initial.

316.Illa and haec are made explicit as the former living things and the latter uprooted logs and stones; the contrast between growth and mere corporeality is not compressed.

317.A separate painted M1482 paragraph sign precedes Cum ergo.

318.The paired premises and their conclusion remain explicit; the unit ends with Ficino's introduction to the objection, as the next painted sign begins its quoted substance.

319.A separate painted M1482 paragraph sign precedes Immo vero; the sentence continues across the M1482 page turn.

320.Tale quiddam and sic affectum retain the opponent's twofold claim: a body of a determinate kind and a body disposed in a determinate way.

321.A separate painted M1482 paragraph sign precedes Quaeremus.

322.Moles, affectio, qualitas, and superadditam are all represented; the reply distinguishes common corporeal bulk from the added condition that makes a body this determinate kind.

About This Reading Edition

Volume II continues Ficino’s inquiry into the immortality of the soul through Books V–VIII. Its arguments consider the rational soul’s self-motion, its relation to the body, sensation, and the powers of the mind. The Latin and independent English translation follow the supplied edition’s facing pages and matching comparison units.

Historical Text and Translation

The Latin reading text is independently established from the Florence 1482 editio princeps (M1482), collated against the Paris 1559 printing (G1559), with the Paris 1641 Opera used only as a late control. Abbreviations are expanded, spelling and punctuation are conservatively normalized, and consequential readings are recorded in the apparatus.

About Diotimos Editions

Diotimos Editions prepared this independent English translation in the voice established in Volume I, preserving Ficino’s argumentative sequence, metaphors, technical distinctions, repetitions, conditions, purposes, and qualifications. Editorial notes and witness variants accompany their passages as numbered notes. The edition and source statement, contents, and reading guidance are also retained. The source locator register remains available in the downloadable edition.