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Translated by Stephen MacKenna and B. S. Page.
Plotinus Resources OnLine and in Print
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» Contents of this Ennead
129 pages - You are on Page 68
6. Souls that descend, souls that change their state — these, then, may be said to have memory, which deals with what has come and gone; but what subjects of remembrance can there be for souls whose lot is to remain unchanged?
The question touches memory in the stars in general, and also in the sun and moon and ends by dealing with the soul of the All, even by audaciously busying itself with the memories of Zeus himself. The enquiry entails the examination and identification of acts of understanding and of reasoning in these beings, if such acts take place.
Now if, immune from all lack, they neither seek nor doubt, and never learn, nothing being absent at any time from their knowledge — what reasonings, what processes of rational investigation, can take place in them, what acts of the understanding?
Even as regards human concerns they have no need for observation or method; their administration of our affairs and of earth’s in general does not go so; the right ordering, which is their gift to the universe, is effected by methods very different.
In other words, they have seen God and they do not remember?
Ah, no: it is that they see God still and always, and that, as long as they see, they cannot tell themselves they have had the vision; such reminiscence is for souls that have lost it.
Reference address : https://ellopos.net/elpenor/greek-texts/ancient-greece/plotinus/enneads-4.asp?pg=68
