Plotini Opera Omnia cum Ficini commentariis

p. 6, 6. INSTRUMENT] Wyttenbach supplies a wealth of examples from philosophers regarding the body as an instrument of the soul, on Plutarch’s Banquet of the Seven Sages, p. 988. In the next part: "for he says it is absurd to say that the soul weaves," he touches upon that of Cebes in Plato’s Phaedo p. 87d, p. 66 (Bekker):—"but the soul weaves again what is being worn away," which Socrates criticizes in the following sections. It must be noted that it is Plotinus’s custom, where he most respects the passages of Plato, to use his own "he says". It is established that the Greeks used their "phe-si" he says, and the Latins their inquit he says, indefinitely—either for they say, they say (plural), or where they imagine an adversary for themselves who might object to something. Hence they almost always used to place it in parentheses. This observation, after Bentley on Horace’s Satires I. 4. 78, was applied by others to Greek and Latin writers: Davies on Cicero’s Tusculan Disputations I. 39, Toup on Longinus § 11, p. 275 (Oxford ed.), Heindorf on Plato’s Gorgias § 166, p. 262, Ruhkopf on Seneca On Benefits II. 11, p. 53, the interpreters on Marinus’s Life of Proclus p. 145 (ed. Boisson), and I myself on Cicero On the Nature of the Gods I. 36, p. 164. However, the Plotinian usage, by which the name of Plato is omitted by ellipsis, has another cause and origin, to be sought from the schools, in which, since the disputants very frequently appealed to the authority of the chief master, that "he says" prevailed in almost the same way as that "he himself said" did among the Pythagoreans. For no one was unaware to whom in the Platonic schools this "he says" pertained. Nor was there any other reason for the Stoics, who by their own "he says" designated either Zeno or Chrysippus. Whence the same usage was transferred into the discussions of Arrian committed to writing, who indeed intends for Epictetus to be declared by his "he says". E.g., III. 2. 6: "This is above us, he says." Cf. I. 16. 8, II. 23. 16, I. 4. 28 and Upton and Schweighaeuser there, Vol. II, p. 62. Cf. Vol. III, p. 472 f.

p. 7, 10. BLOOD AND BILE MUST BOIL] Anyte in Anthology 15: "blood boiled through the skin." Cf. Jacobs VI, p. 432; IX, p. 203. Our author p. 420e (boiling with blood and bile (which passage must be compared entirely) and quite often it is joined with the dative with passion and similar things. See Suidas in boiling with passion. Zonaras p. 955 and Tittman there. But yet Himerius p. 62 (ed. Steph.): "passion boiled more than is moderate." Cf. furthermore Suicer Thesaurus of the Church I, p. 1296, Matthaei on John Chrysostom’s Four Homilies I, p. 62, and Valckenaer’s Scholia on the New Testament II, p. 568.—Hence our author below p. 389:—"such blood is separated by the boiling of passion."

p. 8, 13. OF THE SOUL’S POWER] Regarding the word psychikos of the soul, hold to these words of Aristotle On the Soul II. 12, p. 47 (Sylb.): "And why is it that plants do not perceive, though they have some part of the soul and suffer something from tangible things," and likewise Proclus on Cratylus § 99, p. 56 concerning Jove: "and as having received the whole of Cronus, he is the maker of the triple substance—indivisible, intermediate, and divisible—but according to the Rhea in himself, he fountains a triple life: intellectual, psychic of the soul, and bodily." Moreover, Theophylact on 1 Corinthians XV, p. 308: "a psychic body, that which is governed by the powers of the soul." To the Apostles and ecclesiastical writers, psychikos signifies almost enslaved to the desires of the body and pleasures, and is the opposite of to the spiritual. See Suidas in psychical man, Suicer’s Thesaurus in psychikos, and the interpreters on 1 Corinthians II. 14, especially L. C. Valckenaer’s Scholia on the N.T. Vol. II, p. 137 ff. It is therefore not rarely the same as fleshly. Cf. also Theological Studies and Criticisms by Ullmann and Umbreit I. 2, page 436.

p. 9, 8. FOR INTELLECTIBLE THINGS ALREADY] Apply Ficinus’s Commentary in this place and consult Themistius’s Paraphrase on book I of Aristotle On the Soul (ed. Hermolaus Barbarus, Basel 1533), p. 439 ff., and on book II On the Soul, p. 460 ff.

— 12. WHERE INDEED WE MOST OF ALL] Sc. are. Engelhardt did not improperly compare this Plotinian "we" with that celebrated Ego of the more recent metaphysicians, mostly throughout Germany.