The Heroic Enthusiasts, Part I (Gli Eroici Furori) · 39 of 63 · tr. L. Williams
Fourth Dialogue-f
Hence it follows that not less do we desire to see things unknown and unseen than those known and seen.
And from this it does not follow that the desire does not proceed from cognition, and that we desire something that is not known; but I say that it is certain and sure that we do not desire unknown things.
Because, if they be occult as to particulars, they are not occult as to generals; as in the entire visual power is found the whole of the visible appositely, and in the intellect all the intelligible.
Therefore, as the inclination to the act lies in its appropriateness, the result is that both these powers incline towards the universal action, as to a thing naturally comprehended as good.
The soul, then, did not speak to the deaf or the blind when she counselled her thoughts to repress the sight, which, although it may not be the immediate cause of the will, is yet the primal and principal cause.
Cic .
What do you mean by this last saying?
Tans .
I mean that it is not the figure or the conception, sensibly or intelligently represented, which of itself moves us; because while one stands beholding the figure manifested to the eyes, he does not yet arrive at loving; but from that instant that the soul conceives within itself that figure, not visible, but thinkable; no longer dividual, but individual; no longer classed among things in general, but among things good and beautiful; then immediately love is born.
Now this is the seeing, from which the soul desires to divert the eyes of her thoughts.
Here the sight usually moves the affection to a greater love than the love of that which is seen; for, as I have just said, it always considers, through the universal knowledge that it holds of the beautiful and the good, that, besides the degrees of known conceptions of goodness and beauty, there are others and yet others ad infinitum .
Cic .
How is it that after we become informed of that conception of the beautiful which is begotten in the soul, we yet desire to satisfy the exterior vision?
Tans .
From this, that the soul would ever love that which it loves, and ever see that which it sees.
Therefore she wills that, the conception which has been produced in her through seeing, should not become weakened, enervated and lost; but would ever see more and more, and that which becomes obscure in the interior affection, should be frequently brightened by the exterior aspect, which as it is the principle of being, must also be the principle of conservation.
This results proportionately in the act of understanding and of considering, for as the sight has reference to visible things, so has the intellect to intelligible things.
I believe now that you understand to what end and in what manner the soul tends, when she says "repress the sight." Cic .
I understand very well.
Now continue to unfold what happens to these thoughts.
Tans .
Now follows the disagreement between the mother and the aforesaid children, who having, contrary to her orders, opened their eyes, and, having fixed them on the splendour of the object, they remained in company with the heart.
22.
Cruel sons are ye to me, me whom ye left Still farther to exasperate my pain; And ever without cease ye weary me, Taking away from me my every hope!
Why should the sense remain?
oh, grasping heavens!
Wherefore these broken ruined powers, if not To make me subject and exemplar Of such heavy martyrdom, such lengthened pain?
Leave, dear sons, my winged fire enchained, And let me, some of you once more behold, Come back to me from those retaining claws!
Oh, weariness!
not one returns To bring a late refreshment to my pains.
The Hermetic axiom that the structure of the cosmos is reflected at every scale — 'as above, so below; as within, so without' — making each level a legible map of the others.
The text states 'as the sight has reference to visible things, so has the intellect to intelligible things', establishing a structural parallel.
Eckhart's Abgeschiedenheit/Gelassenheit — radical letting-go of will, image, and grasping that opens the soul to God; distinct from inner_silence (quietness) and from material renunciation, and adjacent to Sufi tark and Buddhist non-grasping as a practice rather than a metaphysical claim.
The instruction to 'repress the sight' implies a letting-go of sensory attachment to access higher truth.
Ecstatic, non-rational receptivity to the divine figured as drunkenness — Plato's symposium wine, Rumi's sukr, Eckhart's 'sober drunkenness'; the passive/receptive metaphor for divine encounter, distinct from divine_madness's active possessing rapture.
The title 'Heroic Enthusiasts' and the description of 'winged fire' align with ecstatic receptivity to the divine.
Ecstatic irrational rapture — Plato's mania, Bruno's furore — by which the soul transcends ordinary reason and attains direct contact with divine reality; madness reframed as higher knowledge.
The passage describes an ecstatic rapture ('enthusiasts', 'furori') where the soul transcends ordinary reason to attain divine reality.
Bruno's eroici furori — a passionate, ennobling spiritual ardor that drives the soul toward divine wisdom; distinguished from base or animal passions by its orientation to infinite truth.
[auto] The passage is from Bruno's work defining this concept, describing the soul's passionate drive ('winged fire') toward infinite truth and beauty.
The doctrine of the universe as boundless and without center or circumference, populated by innumerable worlds — Bruno's rejection of the closed Aristotelian sphere; the divine and the cosmos as ontologically infinite.
[auto] The text explicitly mentions degrees of goodness and beauty extending 'ad infinitum,' reflecting Bruno's doctrine of ontological infinity.
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.
The dialogue describes an ascent through 'degrees of known conceptions of goodness and beauty' toward the universal.
The human being as a small-scale image of the entire cosmos; the body, soul, and intellect mirroring the structure of the heavens and the divine — distinct from correspondence in that it makes the human the privileged mirror.
The intellect is described as containing 'all the intelligible' just as visual power contains the visible, mirroring the cosmos within the soul.
The felt condition of exile from one's divine origin — Rumi's reed flute torn from its bed, Plotinus's 'we have forgotten,' the Gnostic forgetfulness; the affective wound that complements return_to_source and gives the return its motive.
The poem expresses deep pain and longing ('Cruel sons... left... exasperate my pain') indicating a felt exile from the divine source.