Habit, purification and intellectual experiment

Use in the book

Ficino begins his reply by attributing corporealist belief to unfortunate habit rather than argument. Natural power and the outward and inward senses have attended the soul’s body before it practises pure understanding; their appropriate concern with bodies is then mistaken for an exhaustive account of reality. Even mind can misdescribe the soul when it sees only its bodily entanglements. The polemic targets habitual limitation, not a claim that sense never truthfully encounters its own objects: VI.2.8 explicitly grants the reality of corporeal things.

Purification changes the conditions of inquiry. The thinker is urged to make an inward experiment, distinguish imparted bodily life from the soul’s own life, and withdraw as far as possible from motion, sensation, affect and bodily imagination. This is a philosophical discipline of attention, not an instruction to injure or literally remove the body. The ensuing ascent distinguishes reason seeking truth, angelic intellect enjoying already infused truth, and God as truth, light and joy themselves. Avicenna’s imagined upbringing and Plato’s gradual re-education are complementary devices for exposing the contingency of ordinary habituation.

Places to read

1. VI.2.1, VI.2.2Bodily habit is diagnosed through three inadequate teachers.
2. VI.2.3, VI.2.10, VI.2.11Purity and inward experiment prepare an ascent through soul, angel and God.
3. VI.2.12, VI.2.14, VI.2.17Two educational narratives recast the mind’s starting conditions.

Translation in this edition

The imperative “render oneself incorporeal” is immediately glossed by Ficino as withdrawing the mind pro viribus. The short VI.2.11 continues the grammar of VI.2.10 despite having a separate source paragraph sign. Its light–truth–joy reciprocity is not a fourth created grade.

affectus; imaginatio

affectus; imaginatio. Printed forms: affectu; imaginatione corporali.

Affective engagement and bodily imagination. They are among the activities from which attention is to be withdrawn for the proposed intellectual experiment. References: VI.2.10. See Habit, purification and intellectual experiment.

appetitus; proclivis

appetitus; proclivis. Printed forms: appetitum; proclivem.

Appetite or inclination, here leaning toward bodies. Its direction contributes to mind’s misleading view of a soul wrapped in bodily engagements. References: VI.2.2. See Habit, purification and intellectual experiment.

cogere; compellere

cogere; compellere. Printed forms: cogantur; cogatur; cogeris; cogit; cogitur; compelleris; compellimur; compellit; compellitur; compulsos.

To force or compel, by bodily conditions, habit or argumentative necessity. Cogere is not the verb cogitare: habit can compel error, while a dilemma compels an admission; their object and agency distinguish these uses. References: VI.2.1, VI.2.2, VI.2.15, VI.2.17, VI.5.2, VI.8.3, VI.12.3, VI.12.4, VI.12.7. See Habit, purification and intellectual experiment.

consuetudo

consuetudo. Printed forms: consuetudine; consuetudine in hanc sententiam compulsos; consuetudinem.

Familiarity or habitual association. Bodily familiarity can distract attention; withdrawal from it is used as evidence against identity with bodily temperament. References: V.14.2, V.15.9. See Temperament and harmony.

Long habit or familiarity that shapes judgement. Ficino attributes corporealist conviction to bodily habituation rather than rational persuasion. References: VI.2.1, VI.2.10. See Habit, purification and intellectual experiment.

experiri; experientia

experiri; experientia. Printed forms: Experiantur; experientia.

To make trial; experience that tests a philosophical claim. Ficino asks thinkers to examine their own inward life as an approach to separate forms. References: VI.2.10. See Habit, purification and intellectual experiment.

phantasia

phantasia. Printed forms: phantasia; Phantasia; phantasiae; phantasiam.

Imagination, identified here with internal sense. Its material consists of bodily figures and qualities received through sense, explaining why it cannot alone define incorporeal soul. References: VI.2.2. See Habit, purification and intellectual experiment.

Imagination as an attending and judging sensory power. It judges bodily events and shares distress; its sorrow or joy can affect the same soul’s nourishment. References: VII.6.1, VII.6.2, VII.9.2. See Sensation as attentive activity.

Particularizing recognition and judgment operating upon an imagined presentation. It recognizes Plato as this good or beautiful friend but remains bound to his singular circumstances and does not recognize its intentions as incorporeal. References: VIII.1.1, VIII.1.2, VIII.1.4, VIII.1.5. See Images, intentions, and conjecturing substance.

plebeus; minutus

plebeus; minutus. Printed forms: minuti philosophi; plebeos philosophos.

Polemical descriptions of common or narrow philosophers. The labels criticize an intellectual dependence on sense; they are Ficino’s rhetoric, not neutral classifications of social worth. References: VI.2.1, VI.2.10. See Habit, purification and intellectual experiment.

praeceptor; sophista

praeceptor; sophista. Printed forms: magistram; praeceptoribus; sophistis.

Teacher, sophist and mistress or instructor. Natural power and two senses are inadequate teachers of soul’s essence; mind becomes the alternative instructor. References: VI.2.2. See Habit, purification and intellectual experiment.

purificare; purus

purificare; purus. Printed forms: pura; puram; Purificentur.

To purify and to be free from bodily or vicious admixture in the relevant act. The discipline is offered as a change in conditions of cognition, not as a physical procedure for removing the body. References: VI.2.3, VI.2.10. See Habit, purification and intellectual experiment.

quaerere; interrogare; percontari

quaerere; interrogare; percontari. Printed forms: interrogate; interroges; interrogo; percontabor; percontandum; percontatus; quaeram; quaeras; quaere; Quaeremus; quaeritur; rogaretur; rogaveris; sciscitabimur; sciscitamur.

To seek or question, with interrogation of faculties and opponents as distinct uses. The soul searches for itself, questions sense and mind, and tests a philosophical account through alternatives; inquiry is not itself endorsement of an answer. References: VI.2.2, VI.2.3, VI.4.4, VI.5.2, VI.5.4, VI.6.3, VI.6.4, VI.11.1. See Habit, purification and intellectual experiment.

separare; sevocare

separare; sevocare. Printed forms: pro viribus; separatam; Separati; sevocare.

To separate or withdraw, as far as one’s powers permit. The mind is withdrawn from motion, sense, affect and bodily imagination, explaining what “render oneself incorporeal” means here. References: VI.2.10. See Habit, purification and intellectual experiment.