World and universe

Use in the book

The compressed sequence “God is being; the world is a place” distinguishes world from matter, body, and life rather than making them synonyms. The balloon hypothesis pictures the universe as an inflated volume that could collapse back to an atom without ruins. A poem requires three worlds—heavens, earth, and underworld—to create its imaginative space. These are different uses of the world-image, not rival factual descriptions that a lexicon must reconcile.

Places to read

1. I, p. 232, entry 1, ¶1The world is distinguished as a place within a chain of definitions.
2. I, p. 152, entry 3, ¶2The universe is pictured as a deflatable balloon within a hypothesis.
3. II, p. 487, entry begun p. 486, no. 14, ¶3The poem requires three worlds.
4. II, p. 482, entry 13, ¶1Gens du monde means people of society.

Translation in this edition

The English translation retains the explicit hypothetical wording and renders gens du monde as “people of society.” The plural underworld region in les enfers is translated “the underworld,” without naming an unprinted poem.

Use in the book

Traherne’s most forceful use makes the universe depend for its fulfilled purpose upon love. Without a person able to receive and enjoy its objects, visible splendour becomes a silent wilderness. The claim concerns the end of creation rather than a denial that bodies could exist without a human observer.

The relation also reverses apparent scale. The inheriting person can be called greater than the universe, as a householder is greater in kind and purpose than a house. At the Cross one enters its heart, while divine omnipresence is called its life and soul. These expressions make the whole intelligible through relation, presence, and love rather than through the mere addition of its physical parts.

Places to read

1. I.56The Cross is the heart of the universe within the contemplative journey.
2. II.65Failure to love makes the universe vain to its enjoyer.
3. II.93The person’s dignity exceeds the inherited universe as the householder exceeds the house.
4. V.9Divine omnipresence is described as the life and soul of the universe.

In this edition

The word is not a warrant for attributing a modern cosmological system to Traherne. Compare the explicit uncertainty about the material world’s infinity in II.21.

Use in the book

The world is the ordered whole within which body, quality, soul, angel, and God are compared, though God is their source rather than one bodily component among others. Ficino calls soul the bond of nature and says it presides over the world's machinery. Such language stresses connection and governance. The universe's order also grounds arguments from the human mind's capacities: since a limited embodied mind can rise toward indivisible forms, the whole cannot lack the superior power required for that order. Celestial spheres supply recurrent examples of proportion, stable motion, and greater nobility; earth and water appear very small relative to higher spheres. These claims belong to the cosmology presented by Ficino and those he cites. Its universal life-giving cause is developed through local arguments rather than a fully elaborated world-soul doctrine in every occurrence.

Further passage references. I.1.7; I.3.13, I.3.23, I.3.25–I.3.262; I.5.18, I.5.25–I.5.28234

Places to read

1. I.1.7The five-grade program places soul over the world’s machinery and between the higher and lower grades.
2. I.3.13 and I.3.23–26234The larger world’s order is invoked to explain powers manifest even in a limited embodied mind.
3. I.5.18 and I.5.25–28234Cosmic scale and differentiated heavenly motions supply arguments about higher intellectual causes.

Translation in this edition

“Machinery of the world” is an image of connected order and rule in the program of the work. It does not certify a modern mechanical model or make God a bodily member of the universe alongside the grades he causes.

mundus / universum

mundus / universum. Printed forms: mundanae; mundi; mundo; mundum; universam; universi; universum; universus.

World and universe as an ordered whole. The human mind is a part of the universe, so Ficino reasons that the whole cannot lack the perfection exemplified by its part; the inference is metaphysical rather than a measurement of cosmic intelligence. References: I.3.2, I.3.13. See World and universe.

World or universe as an ordered whole, distinguished from its unrestricted divine source. The world is not coextensive with divine presence; preservation is argued whether this whole always existed or began. References: II.2.8, II.6.13, II.7.18. See World and universe.

World / universe or universal whole. The good and order of the whole are distinguished from one component’s isolated apparent advantage. References: II.12.19, II.13.23. See World and universe.