Plotino - Tratado 27,32 (IV, 3, 32) — Isto que se lembram as almas; a sua saída do corpo (2)

32. ¿Y cómo recordamos a nuestros amigos, a nuestros hijos y a nuestra mujer? ¿Cómo también recordamos a nuestra patria y todo lo que un hombre inteligente puede recordar sin que el hecho resulte insólito? Digamos que el alma (inferior) recuerda con algún sentimiento, cosa que no ocurre al hombre, insensible en muchos de sus recuerdos. Porque, tal vez al principio el hombre experimente alguna emoción, junto con sus recuerdos; en tal caso, el alma superior misma podrá experimentar las más nobles de las emociones según la relación que mantenga con el alma inferior. Conviene, no obstante, que el alma inferior quiera actuar en sus operaciones lo mismo que el alma superior, y aun, sobre todo, adquirir los mismos recuerdos, si es un alma verdaderamente inteligente; porque, en principio, se hace uno mejor por la enseñanza que recibe de un ser superior.

Pero el alma superior debe querer olvidar lo que viene a ella del alma inferior. Porque, siendo como es un alma inteligente, podrá contener por fuerza al alma de naturaleza inferior. Cuanto más intente elevarse hacia lo alto, más olvidará también las cosas de este mundo; salvo que toda su vida, ya aquí en la tierra, se aplique tan sólo a recordar las cosas mejores, pues es igualmente hermoso dar de lado en este mundo a las preocupaciones de los hombres, con lo cual, necesariamente, se prescindirá de sus recuerdos. Así podrá decirse, y con razón, que el alma buena es un alma olvidadiza; porque huye de todo lo que es múltiple, conduce lo múltiple a la unidad y repudia lo indeterminado. Esta alma no se acompaña de los recuerdos de aquí abajo, sino que es ligera y vive consigo misma. Incluso en este mundo, cuando quiere elevarse a lo inteligible, deja por esto todas las demás cosas. Muy pocos recuerdos se lleva consigo a la región de lo alto; algunos más, sin embargo, la acompañará en el cielo. Hércules (en el Hades) podría hablar todavía de su bravura; pero, con todo, la estimaría como algo de poco valor al encontrarse ya en un lugar sagrado y en el mundo inteligible, pues es claro que aquí dispondría de fuerzas superiores, semejantes a las de los sabios en sus luchas.

XXXII. Que dirons-nous du souvenir des amis, des parents, d’une épouse, de la patrie et de tout ce qu’un homme vertueux peut se rappeler convenablement ?

Dans l’image de l’âme [l’âme irraisonnable] ces souvenirs seront accompagnés d’une affection passive ; mais dans l’homme [l’âme raisonnable] ils n’en seront pas accompagnés : car les affections existent dès le principe dans l’âme inférieure ; dans l’âme supérieure, par suite de son commerce avec l’autre, il y a aussi quelques affections, mais seulement des affections honnêtes. Il convient à l’âme inférieure de chercher à se rappeler les actes de l’âme supérieure, surtout quand elle a été elle-même convenablement cultivée : car elle peut devenir meilleure dès le principe et se former par l’éducation qu’elle reçoit de l’autre. Quant à l’âme supérieure, elle doit volontiers oublier ce qui lui vient de l’âme inférieure. Elle peut d’ailleurs, quand elle est bonne, contenir par sa puissance l’âme qui lui est subordonnée [1]. Plus elle désire se rapprocher du monde intelligible, plus elle doit oublier les choses d’ici-bas, à moins que toute la vie qu’elle a menée ici-bas ne soit telle qu’elle n’ait confié à sa mémoire que des choses louables [2]. Dans ce monde même, en effet, il est beau de s’affranchir des préoccupations humaines ; il est donc convenable également de les y oublier toutes. On peut en ce sens dire avec raison que l’âme vertueuse doit être oublieuse. Elle échappe ainsi au multiple, elle ramène le multiple à l’unité, et abandonne l’indéterminé. Elle cesse donc de vivre avec le multiple, elle s’allége [3] et vit pour elle-même. En effet, quand, étant encore ici-bas, elle désire vivre dans le monde intelligible, elle néglige tout ce qui est étranger à sa nature. Elle retient donc peu de choses terrestres quand elle est arrivée au monde intelligible ; elle en a plus quand elle habite le ciel. Hercule [dans le ciel] peut bien se glorifier de sa valeur ; mais cette valeur même lui paraît peu de chose quand il est arrivé à une région plus sainte encore que le ciel, quand il habite le monde intelligible, et qu’il s’est élevé au-dessus d’Hercule lui-même par la force qu’il a déployée dans ces luttes qui sont les luttes des vrais sages.

32. But what about the memories of our friends and children and wife ? Of our country, and all the things it w’ould not be absurd for a man of quality to remember ? Now the image-making power remembers each of these with emotion, but the man of quality would have his memories of them without emotion; for the emotion, perhaps, w’as in the imaging power even from the beginning, and those of the emotions which have any good quality pass to the noble soul, in so far as it has any communication with the other one. It is proper for the whole soul to aspire to the activities of the memory of the higher soul, especially wiien it is of good quality itself: for a lower soul can be comparatively good from the beginning and can become so as a result of education by the higher soul. But the higher soul ought to be happy to forget what it has received from the worse soul. For it could be that even when the higher soul is noble, the other soul is naturally a rather bad one and is restrained forcibly by the higher soul. The more it presses on towards the heights the more it will forget, unless perhaps all its life, even here below, has been such that its memories are only of higher things; since here below too it is best to be detached from human concerns, and so necessarily from human memories; so that if anyone said that the good soul was forgetful, it would be correct to say so in this sort of sense. For the higher soul also flies from multiplicity, and gathers multiplicity into one and abandons the indefinite; because in this way it will not be [clogged] with multiplicity but light and alone by itself; for even here below, when it wants to be in that higher world, while it is still here beknv it abandons everything that is different [from that world]; and there are few things here that are also there; and when it is in heaven it will abandon still more. And Homer’s Heracles might talk about his heroic deeds; but the man who thinks these of little account and has migrated to a holier place, and has been stronger than Heracles in the contexts in which the wise compete. [4].

XXXII. What, however, ought we to say concerning the remembrance of friends, and children, and wives; and also of our country, and other things which it is not absurd to recollect? Shall we say that the image of the soul will remember each of these accompanied with passion, but that the superior soul will recollect these impassively? For passion, perhaps, was from the first in this image. And such of the passions as are of an elegant nature, are in the worthy [i.e., the superior] soul, so far as it communicates with the other. It is fit, however, that the inferior soul should also desire the recollection of the energies of the other soul, and especially when it has likewise become itself elegant and worthy. But this inferior soul may from the first become better, in consequence of being disciplined by the more excellent soul. The latter, however, will gladly resign to oblivion the concerns of the former. For it may happen, that the latter soul being worthy, the former which is of an inferior nature, may be forcibly restrained by the superior soul. And in proportion as this more excellent soul hastens to the intelligible, it will forget the concerns of this world, unless the whole of its life here, has been such as to preserve the remembrance alone of things of the most exalted nature. For here also it is beautiful to abandon human pursuits: [and this is the work of perfect virtue]. A forgetfulness, therefore, of such pursuits, is necessary in another life. Hence, he who says that the worthy soul is oblivious, will in such a way as we have mentioned speak rightly. For it will fly from the many, and will collect multitude into one, dismissing that which is infinite. For thus it will not associate with multitude, but expelling it will live by itself: since here also, when it wishes to be in the intelligible world, while an inhabitant of earth, it dismisses all other concerns. Hence, when it is there, it remembers but few things of a terrestrial nature; but it remembers more of them when it is in the heavens. And Hercules, indeed, [when in Hades] may speak of his own fortitude; but in the intelligible world, he will consider these things as trifling, being transferred into a more sacred place, and strenuously engaging even above himself, in those contests in which the wise wish to engage.

32. But the memory of friends, children, wife? Country too, and all that the better sort of man may reasonably remember?

All these, the one [the lower man] retains with emotion, the authentic man passively: for the experience, certainly, was first felt in that lower phase from which, however, the best of such impressions pass over to the graver soul in the degree in which the two are in communication.

The lower soul must be always striving to attain to memory of the activities of the higher: this will be especially so when it is itself of a fine quality, for there will always be some that are better from the beginning and bettered here by the guidance of the higher.

The loftier, on the contrary, must desire to come to a happy forgetfulness of all that has reached it through the lower: for one reason, there is always the possibility that the very excellence of the lower prove detrimental to the higher, tending to keep it down by sheer force of vitality. In any case the more urgent the intention towards the Supreme, the more extensive will be the soul’s forgetfulness, unless indeed, when the entire living has, even here, been such that memory has nothing but the noblest to deal with: in this world itself, all is best when human interests have been held aloof; so, therefore, it must be with the memory of them. In this sense we may truly say that the good soul is the forgetful. It flees multiplicity; it seeks to escape the unbounded by drawing all to unity, for only thus is it free from entanglement, light-footed, self-conducted. Thus it is that even in this world the soul which has the desire of the other is putting away, amid its actual life, all that is foreign to that order. It brings there very little of what it has gathered here; as long as it is in the heavenly regions only, it will have more than it can retain.

The Hercules of the heavenly regions would still tell of his feats: but there is the other man to whom all of that is trivial; he has been translated to a holier place; he has won his way to the Intellectual Realm; he is more than Hercules, proven in the combats in which the combatants are the wise.