Enneads II 1: On the Kosmos or on the Heavenly System

II 1: On the Kosmos or on the Heavenly System

Is the universe eternal, or does it have a beginning and an end?

Well, we are alive, and we are a part of the universe, so therefore the universe must be alive. Further, all living things have a body and a soul, and so the universe must also have a body and a soul. Now, our bodies are ever-changing, but our souls are eternal; the universe cannot exist in any lesser capacity than its parts, so the universe's soul, at least, must too be eternal.

But what about the universe's body? There is a fundamental difference between us and the universe: we are open systems, and take our bodies from outside of ourselves. But there is nothing outside of the universe, so it must be a closed system. So while we may discard our bodies again, the universe cannot: it must endlessly recycle itself. So the universe's body must also be eternal, and therefore the universe as a whole.

But everything follows its nature: that means the fundamental nature of our beings must be different than the fundamental nature of the universe's being. And so we are not of the same order: the universe is sprung from the primary God, while we are—at best!—sprung from secondary Gods that are themselves the offspring of that primary God.

I'm butchering Plotinus' argument, I'm sure, but that's no reason not to try!

Enneads II 2: The Heavenly Circuit

II 2: The Heavenly Circuit

The One is the highest Good. As a reflection of this, lesser things, in order to obtain a Good, attempt to become one with that Good. We call this Desire, and it is the cause of motion: when something desires another thing, it moves towards it.

The first thing beneath the One is Beauty. Beauty desires only Itself, because there is nothing else, and so it has no motion.

Beneath Beauty is Soul. Soul is timeless and does not change, but since Soul desires things external to itself, it must move: this implies that its motion must be limited in such a way that it never changes state; therefore it must move in a cyclic fashion. Another way to think of this is that it tries to move towards its Good, but since it cannot coincide with its Good (or it would change state by ceasing to be), it must "miss" it and continually orbit it.

Beneath Soul is Body. Even though Body is animated by Soul and tries to imitate it, it is hampered by friction and cannot maintain perpetual motion. Thus bodies move in straight lines. The planets, however, are nonetheless able to move in circles despite their bodies because they are not hampered by friction—there is nothing to stop them in space.

I was very confused back when we read Sallustius VII; his passing mention of nonmaterial things moving struck me as odd. It's nice to finally get a deeper look at what was meant by all that!