The Heroic Enthusiasts, Part I (Gli Eroici Furori) · 58 of 63 · tr. L. Williams
Fifth Dialogue-n
Of necessity, one is according to the sum of the other, seeing that where things are finite it may result in this, that it is more wise than beautiful or good, more good and beautiful than wise, more wise and good than powerful, and more powerful than good or wise.
But where there is infinite wisdom there cannot be other than infinite power, otherwise there would be no infinite knowledge.
Where there is infinite goodness there must be infinite wisdom, otherwise there would be no infinite goodness.
Where there is infinite power there must be infinite goodness and wisdom, because there is the being able to know and the knowing to be able.
Now, observe how the object of this enthusiast, who is, as it were, inebriated with the drink of the gods, is incomparably higher than others which are different.
I mean to say that the divine essence comprehends in the very highest degree perfection of all kinds, so that according to the degree in which this particular form may have participated, he can understand all, do all, and be such an attached friend to one that he may come to feel contempt and indifference towards every other beauty.
Therefore to her should be consecrated the spherical apple as to her who seems to be all in all; not to Venus, who is beautiful but is surpassed in wisdom by Minerva, and by Juno in majesty; not to Pallas than whom Venus is more beautiful, and the other more magnificent; not to Juno, who is not the goddess of intelligence or of love.
Cic.
Truly, as are the degrees of Nature and of the essences, so in proportion are the degrees of the intelligible orders and the glories of the amorous affections and enthusiasms.
XII.
Cic.
The following bears a head with four faces, which blow towards the four corners of the heavens, and are four winds in one subject; above these stand two stars, and in the centre the legend "Novae ortae aeoliae." I would like to know what that signifies.
Tans.
I think that the meaning of this device is consequent upon that which precedes it, for, as there the object is declared to be infinite beauty, so here is proposed what may be called a similar aspiration, study, affection, and desire.
I believe that these winds are set to signify sighs; but this we shall see when we come to read the lines: 36.
Sons of the Titan Astræus and Aurora, Who trouble heaven, earth, and the wide sea, Leave now this stormy war of elements, And fight anon with the high gods.
No more in my Æolian caves ye dwell, No more does my restraining power compel; But caught are ye and closed within that breast, With moans and sobs and bitter sighs opprest.
Turbulent brothers of the stars, Companions of the tempests of the seas, Those lights are all that may avail Peace to restore; murderous yet innocent; Which, open or concealed, Will bless with calm, or curse with pride.
Evidently, here, Æolus is introduced as speaking to the winds, which he declares are no longer tempered by him in the Æolian caverns, but by two stars in the breast of this enthusiast.
Here, the two stars do not mean the two eyes which are in the forehead, but the two appreciable kinds of divine beauty and goodness, of that infinite splendour, which so influences intellectual and rational desire, that it brings him to a condition of infinite aspiration, according to the way and the degree with which he comes to comprehend that glorious light.
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.
[auto] Explicitly states 'as are the degrees of Nature... so in proportion are the degrees of the intelligible orders,' reflecting the Hermetic axiom.
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.
Describes feeling 'contempt and indifference towards every other beauty' in favor of the divine.
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.
[auto] The enthusiast is described as 'inebriated with the drink of the gods,' a direct metaphor for divine intoxication.
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.
[auto] The text describes the enthusiast as inebriated and transcending ordinary reason through ecstatic rapture.
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.
Degrees of nature and essences are linked to degrees of intelligible orders.
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 explicitly defines the enthusiast's state as an inebriation with divine drink driving them toward infinite truth.
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 passage emphasizes the ontological infinity of divine wisdom, power, and goodness over finite distinctions.
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 outlines 'degrees... of the amorous affections and enthusiasms' corresponding to degrees of Nature, mirroring the scala amoris.
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 enthusiast's breast contains the 'two stars' and winds, reflecting cosmic elements within the human.
The doctrine — central to Eastern Orthodox and Maximian theology — that the human person is progressively transformed into a partaker of the divine nature by grace, not merely justified or united in passing ecstasy.
States that through participation in the divine form, one can 'understand all, do all,' implying deification.