Select Works, Section 28

A form of meditation that uses imagery, imagination, or symbolic thought rather than purely empty stillness.

[auto] The passage prescribes a system of mental discipline to recognize beauty in arts, sciences, and virtues.

The material body viewed as a prison, tomb, or source of error that hinders spiritual knowledge and return.

[auto] The lover must fall down no longer before embodied forms and discern the principle apart from material forms.

Ontological opposition between two primal principles (light/darkness, truth/lie, spirit/matter) as the fundamental structure of reality.

[auto] A clear distinction is drawn between the material forms and the immaterial One Principle springing from another source.

The doctrine that God has no parts, divisions, or composite attributes; pure undivided being.

[auto] The 'One Principle' is described as underlying all and apart from composite material forms.

A chain of divine beings or principles flowing downward from a single transcendent source (the One or the Father), each level less perfect than the one above.

[auto] The progression from virtues to Intellectual-Principle to Authentic-Existent implies a hierarchical flow of being.

Salvation through direct experiential knowledge of the divine nature, not through faith, ritual, or moral works alone.

[auto] Salvation is framed as discerning the One Principle and recognizing beauty through mental discipline rather than ritual.

The absolutely simple, undivided first principle from which all multiplicity and existence flows.

[auto] The 'One Principle underlying all' is identified as the ultimate source apart from material forms.

The merging of the individual soul or self with the divine, transcending personal identity.

[auto] The upward way leads to the Intellectual-Principle and Authentic-Existent, implying union with the divine source.

The dissolution of binary oppositions (male/female, inner/outer, above/below) as a mark of spiritual completion.

[auto] Particular forms are brought under the one principle, unifying the severed aspects of reality.

The soul's journey back to its divine origin, reversing the fall into matter through stages of purification or illumination.

[auto] The passage explicitly describes the soul's journey from being severed from beauty back to the One Principle via an upward way.

A staged journey of the soul upward through heavenly realms or levels of being toward the divine source.

[auto] The text details a staged journey from embodied forms through virtues to the Intellectual-Principle and beyond.

The doctrine that all existence is ultimately one substance or one divine reality; non-duality as a theological claim.

[auto] The text emphasizes bringing severed and particular forms under the one principle underlying all.