The Heroic Enthusiasts, Part II (Gli Eroici Furori) · 34 of 49 · tr. L. Williams
Third Dialogue-f
Here the eyes imprint upon the heart, that is upon the intelligence, and rouse in the will an infinite torment of love, where there is no pain because nothing is sought which is not obtained; but it is happiness, because that which is there sought is always found, and there is no satiety, inasmuch as there is always appetite, and therefore enjoyment; in this it is not like the food of the body, the which with satiety loses enjoyment, has no pleasure before the enjoyment, nor after enjoyment, but only in the enjoyment itself, and where it passes certain limits it comes to feel annoyance and disgust.
Behold, then, in a certain analogy, how the highest good ought to be also infinite, in order that it should not some time turn to evil; as food, which is good for the body, if it is not limited, may come to be poison.
Thus it is that the water of the ocean does not extinguish that flame, and the rigour of the Arctic circle does not mitigate that ardour.
Therefore it is bad through (the) one hand, which holds him and rejects him; it holds him, because it has him for its own; it rejects him because, flying from him, the higher it makes itself the more he ascends upwards to it; the more he follows it, the further off it appears, by reason of its high excellence, according as it is said: Accedit homo ad cor altum, et exaltabitur Deus.
Such blessedness of affection begins in this life, and in this state it has its mode of being.
Hence the heart can say that it is within with the body, and without with the sun, in so far as the soul with its twin faculty, puts into operation two functions: the one to vivify and realize the animal body, the other to contemplate superior things; so that it is in receptive potentiality from above, as it is in re-active potentiality below, towards the body.
The body is, as it were, dead, and as it were apart from the soul, the which is its life and its perfection; and the soul is as it were dead, and a thing apart from the superior illuminating intelligence, from which the intellect is derived as to its nature and acts.
Therefore, the heart is said to be the beginning of life, and not to be alive, it is said to belong to the animating soul, and that this does not belong to it; because it is inflamed by Divine love, and finally converted into fire, which can set on fire that which comes near it, seeing that it has contracted into itself the divinity; it is made god, and consequently in its kind it can inspire others with love; as the splendour of the sun may be seen and admired in the moon.
And as for that which belongs to the consideration of the eyes, know, that in the present discourse they have two functions; one to impress the heart, the other to receive the impression of the heart; as this also has two functions, one to receive the impressions from the eyes, the other to impress them.
The eyes study the species and propose them to the heart; the heart desires them, and presents his desire to the eyes; these conceive the light, diffuse it, and kindle the fire in the heart, which heated and kindled, sends its waters (umore) to them, so that they may dispose of them[AA] (digeriscano).
Thus, firstly, cognition moves the affection, and soon the affection moves the cognition.
The transformation of base substance — outer matter or the inner soul — into a purified, perfected, or 'gold' state; the magnum opus as both laboratory practice and spiritual allegory.
The transformation of the heart into fire and the soul being 'made god' mirrors spiritual alchemy.
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 analogy of the sun's splendour seen in the moon illustrates the reflection of higher realities in lower ones.
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.
A hierarchy is described where the body derives from the soul, and the soul from superior illuminating intelligence.
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.
The passage describes the 'infinite torment of love' and divine 'ardour' that defines Bruno's concept of heroic enthusiasm.
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.
The passage argues the highest good must be infinite to avoid turning to evil, reflecting Bruno's ontology of 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 text outlines an ascent through love and ardor towards the highest good, central to Bruno's adaptation of Diotima's ladder.
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 text explicitly states the heart is 'within with the body, and without with the sun,' mirroring cosmic structure in the human.
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 soul is described as 'dead' and apart from the superior illuminating intelligence until inflamed.
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.
The soul is described as being 'made god' after contracting divinity into itself through love.