Million Book Collection - The Fishers of Men Ministries

2/4 THE FORMATION OF CHRISTENDOMtakes place neither by an act of Thought or Will, norby a logical necessity, but by a purely physical effect,being moreover a procession which ever diminishes incompleteness, though this weakening is only the effect,not the substance of the Original Being. And wemust note secondly, that in the relation thus maintainedbetween the Divine and the Finite, the Finitehas no being of its own, is mere accident, mereappearance of the Divine. Everything which is Derivedis upborne by the powers which streamfrom the Primal Being. These are not separated fromtheir origin, so that one operation embraces, penetrates,determines all things.This presence l of the Divine is always brought intot for the lower degrees of being by the highThe part works first upon the part, then ththrough the part. The corporeal world is in thSoul: the Soul in the Mind : the Mind in the OmOr, again, of the unfolding spheres, the Innermost, orMind, is enlightened by the Centre; the Second, orSoul, by the Mind ; the Third, or Corporeal, by theSoul. Hence the Corporeal moves itself first towardsthe Soul ; the Soul towards the Mind ; and both onlyin this gradation towards the First One.The Primal Being,2 the Original Unity, the Onei is likewise Good, being above reason and theknowledge of reason, out of the superabundance of itspower causes an image of itself to go forth, as the sunsends forth its beams. The likeness of necessity turnsitself to its original, in order to contemplate it, andthereby becomes Mind. The Ideas are immanent inthe Mind, but not as mere thoughts, rather as portionstself substantially existing in it. They make in1 Zeller, v. 453. 2 Ueberweg, i. 244.