Select Works of Plotinus · 60 of 752 · tr. Thomas Taylor

Select Works, Section 66 (part 2)

The dishonour of the Soul is in its ceasing to be clean and apart.

Gold is degraded when it is mixed with earthy particles; if these be worked out, the gold is left and is beautiful, isolated from all that is foreign, gold with gold alone.

And so the Soul; let it be but cleared of the desires that come by its too intimate converse with the body, emancipated from all the passions, purged of all that embodiment has thrust upon it, withdrawn, a solitary, to itself again- in that moment the ugliness that came only from the alien is stripped away.

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Themes

Ladder Of Lovesoteriology

Diotima's staged ascent from love of beautiful bodies → beautiful souls → beautiful pursuits → beautiful knowledge → Beauty itself; the canonical scala amoris that grounds Plotinus's On the Beautiful and Bruno's Eroici Furori — distinct from generic spiritual_ascent in that eros is the specific motive force.

[auto] The passage explicitly describes the ascent from love of beauty outside sense to the beauty of souls and virtues, mirroring Diotima's scala amoris.

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Return To Sourcesoteriology

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

[auto] The text urges the soul to 'win back his grace' and 'make himself what he was,' reversing the fall into matter.

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Related passages · 8 parallels

christian_mysticism|Pseudo-Dionysius: The Divine Names|Chapter 1, Section 1d

“And we press upwards to those beams which in the Holy Scripture shine upon us; wherefrom we gain the light which leads us unto 55 the Divine praises 64 64 πρὸς τοὺς θεαρχικοὺς ὕμνους. Either (1) “leads us to declare the Divine praises”; or…”

Shared concept: Return To Source — The soul's journey back to its divine origin, reversing the fall into matter through stages of purification or illumination. (derived)

renaissance_hermeticism|The Heroic Enthusiasts, Part I (Gli Eroici Furori)|INTRODUCTION-j

“The body is in the soul, the soul is in the mind, the mind is in God. The life of the soul is the true life of the man. Of all his various faculties, that which rules all, that which exalts our nature, is Thought. By means of it we rise…”

Shared concept: Ladder Of Love — Diotima's staged ascent from love of beautiful bodies → beautiful souls → beautiful pursuits → beautiful knowledge → Beauty itself; the canonical scala amoris that grounds Plotinus's On the Beautiful and Bruno's Eroici Furori — distinct from generic spiritual_ascent in that eros is the specific motive force. (derived)

western_esoteric|Tertium Organum (P.D. Ouspensky)|Chapter XIX (part 7)

“In the reduction of your soul to its simplest self, its divine essence, you realize this union—this identity. But this sublime condition is not of permanent duration. It is only now and then that we can enjoy this elevation above the limi…”

christian_mysticism|Pseudo-Dionysius: The Mystical Theology|Chapter I-b

“They are useful and necessary up to a point, but the Truth lies beyond them and is to be apprehended to a supernatural manner by what later writers call “infused” contemplation. The sum of the whole matter is that God is incomprehensible.…”

Shared concept: Return To Source — The soul's journey back to its divine origin, reversing the fall into matter through stages of purification or illumination. (derived)

western_esoteric|The Book of Ceremonial Magic (A.E. Waite)|Page 5 (part 4)

“Blessed and Holy are those who receive the experience of God in the dilucid contemplation, but sanctity and benediction and all in all is that state wherein contemplation is ineffably unified, by a super-eminent leap over of love, with that…”

Shared concept: Return To Source — The soul's journey back to its divine origin, reversing the fall into matter through stages of purification or illumination. (derived)

theosophy|The Secret Doctrine|Page 15 (part 13)

“Thus proceed the cycles of the septenary evolution, in Septennial nature; the Spiritual or divine; the psychic or semi-divine; the intellectual, the passional, the instinctual, or cognitional; the semi-corporeal and the purely material or p…”

Shared concept: Return To Source — The soul's journey back to its divine origin, reversing the fall into matter through stages of purification or illumination. (derived)

renaissance_hermeticism|The Heroic Enthusiasts, Part I (Gli Eroici Furori)|Third Dialogue-h

“In which generation finding themselves once more through the changes which permutably succeed, they return again to the superior forms. Cic . So that they mean, that souls are impelled by the necessity of fate, and have no proper counsel…”

christian_mysticism|Pseudo-Dionysius: The Divine Names|Chapter 4, Section 1ai

“Spenser: “He loved Himself because Himself was fair.” CE Plato’s Doctrine of ἔρως. This Yearning is eternally fulfilled in the Trinity. Cf. Dante: ”O somma luce che sofa in Te sidi / sola T’ intendi e da Te intelletta / ed intendente Te…”