Plotino - Tratado 28,14 (IV, 4, 14) — Zeus enquanto alma do mundo (5)

14. En cuanto a los cuerpos que decimos engendrados por la naturaleza, los elementos son la misma naturaleza. Pero, en cuanto a los animales y a las plantas, ¿podríamos afirmar que poseen la naturaleza como si estuviese depositada en ellos? Comparemos a la naturaleza con una luz de la que el aire nada conserva cuando ella se va, ya que la luz y el aire son dos cosas distintas y separadas que no alcanzan a mezclarse. Y apurando la comparación podríamos añadir que la naturaleza es como el fuego, que deja un cierto calor en el objeto que ha calentado, una vez que ha desaparecido; no obstante, ese calor es distinto al calor del fuego, puesto que es algo que experimenta el objeto calentado. La forma que da la naturaleza al objeto que ella modela debe ser considerada como algo diferente a la naturaleza misma. Con todo, habrá que buscar todavía si existe algo intermedio entre esta forma y la naturaleza.

En cuanto a la diferencia entre la naturaleza y la sabiduría que se encuentra en el universo, ya nos hemos referido a ella.

XIV. Les corps engendrés par la Nature sont les éléments (στοιχεῖα) (33). Quant aux animaux et aux végétaux, possèdent-ils la Nature comme l’air possède la lumière qui ne laisse rien à l’air en se retirant, parce qu’elle ne s’y est pas mélangée, qu’elle en est restée séparée (34)? Ou bien la Nature est-elle avec les animaux et les végétaux dans le même rapport que le feu est avec le corps échauffé, auquel, en se retirant, il laisse une chaleur qui est autre que la chaleur propre au feu et qui constitue une modification du corps échauffé? Oui, sans doute. La Nature donne à l’être qu’elle façonne (τῷ πλασθέντι) une forme (μορφή]] qui est autre que la forme (εἶδος) propre à la Nature elle-même (35). Reste à rechercher s’il y a quelque intermédiaire entre la Nature et l’être qu’elle façonne (36). Quant à la différence qui existe entre la Nature et la Sagesse qui préside à l’univers, nous l’avons suffisamment déterminée.

THERE IS CONTINUITY BETWEEN NATURE AND THE ELEMENTS.

14. The bodies begotten by nature are the elements. As to the animals and the plants, do they possess nature as the air possesses the light which when retiring does not injure the air, because it never mingled with the air, and remained separate from it? Or is nature’s relation to animals and plants the same as that of the fire with a heated body, to which, on retiring, it leaves a warmth which is different from the heat characteristic of the fire, and which constitutes a modification of the heated body? Surely this. To the essence which it moulds, nature gives a shape, which is different from the form proper to nature herself. We might however still consider whether there be any intermediary between nature and the essence which she moulds. However, we have sufficiently determined the difference that exists between nature and the wisdom which presides over the universe.

14. Of the corporeal thus brought into being by Nature the elemental materials of things are its very produce, but how do animal and vegetable forms stand to it?

Are we to think of them as containers of Nature present within them?

Light goes away and the air contains no trace of it, for light and air remain each itself, never coalescing: is this the relation of Nature to the formed object?

It is rather that existing between fire and the object it has warmed: the fire withdrawn, there remains a certain warmth, distinct from that in the fire, a property, so to speak, of the object warmed. For the shape which Nature imparts to what it has moulded must be recognized as a form quite distinct from Nature itself, though it remains a question to be examined whether besides this [specific] form there is also an intermediary, a link connecting it with Nature, the general principle.

The difference between Nature and the Wisdom described as dwelling in the All has been sufficiently dealt with.