Intellectual generation and daily renewal

Use in the book

Mind forms and perfects itself through understanding and willing. Ficino connects this to the apostle Paul's language of daily renewal. He then compares natural generation, which achieves a kind of immortality through successive offspring, with intellectual generation, whose products remain within the generating mind. The continuity of an external lineage is therefore distinguished from the supposed permanence of an individual intellectual parent.

The mind produces accounts of itself and other things whenever it understands. Because the generative activity remains within it, Ficino argues that the enduring power is preserved there too. He adds that what can confer the higher benefit of being well should be able to confer being in the relevant formal respect. Contemplation and ethical formation supply the examples of self-perfection.

This language must be read with the immediately following qualifications. Ficino does not simply adopt the claim that mind efficiently creates its own essence. He distances himself from Proclus's stronger statement and subsequently specifies formal, not efficient, self-causation. “Making itself” in the earlier sentences cannot safely be detached from that restriction.

The proof also links source, path and terminus: an act proceeding from mind, through mind and upon mind is not explained by inserting an external bodily intermediary. The question becomes whether such a power can continue to operate and live separately from body.

Places to read

1. VI.12.12Cross-book scope comparison: perpetual essential life is distinguished from cognitive powers and acts that may be interrupted.
2. VIII.15.2Daily renewal, inward offspring, being-well and the source/path/terminus of self-operation support the argument.
3. VIII.15.3The subsequent explicit formal-cause restriction governs the self-production language.

Translation in this edition

The correction perficit, not proficit, is adopted in the opening claim that mind forms and perfects itself. The Pauline reference is Ficino's attribution; no exact independently verified biblical quotation is being claimed here.

VIII.15.2 says semper intelligendo atque volendo, “always understanding and willing,” and its emphatic wording is retained. VI.12.12, however, distinguishes the essence’s perpetual vital motion from powers and acts that can be interrupted or go astray. These formulations should be compared without silently replacing either: the present account of continual intellectual renewal does not, by itself, establish uninterrupted ordinary conscious attention. The relation between essential life and the exercise of cognition requires its own explanation.

formare / perficere (intellectual self-formation)

formare / perficere (intellectual self-formation). Printed forms: format; formetur; perficiatur; perficit.

To form and perfect; here intellectual activity gives its own subject further determination and perfection. Intellect forms and perfects itself through understanding, willing, contemplation and conduct. The inference to sustaining being is qualified secundum formam. It must be distinguished from efficient production of oneself from nothing and from the stronger claim left to Proclus. References: VIII.15.2. See Intellectual generation and daily renewal.

generatio / genitrix / successio

generatio / genitrix / successio. Printed forms: generationis; genitrice; nascentium; successione.

Generation, generating parent and succession of offspring. Natural reproduction preserves a kind through later beings; intellectual generation keeps its accounts within the individual mind that produces them. References: VIII.15.2. See Intellectual generation and daily renewal.

Paulus apostolus

Paulus apostolus. Printed forms: apostolus; Paulus.

Paul the apostle, named for the language of daily renewal. The reference supports Ficino's interpretation of inward perfection; this contribution does not supply an independently collated biblical quotation. References: VIII.15.2. See Intellectual generation and daily renewal.

renovare / renovatio

renovare / renovatio. Printed forms: cotidianae; renovare; renovationis.

Renewal and daily renovation, the activity of intellectual self-perfection. Ficino invokes Paul's language while explaining how understanding and willing keep mind related to its own formal perfecter. References: VIII.15.2. See Intellectual generation and daily renewal.

Paul (authorities and interlocutors)

Paul. Daily inward renewal enters the account of intellectual life and generation. The reference is explained in its immediate argument; no independently verified biblical verse number is supplied. References: VIII.15.2. See Intellectual generation and daily renewal.