As reason proceeds from Intelligence and Life, which possesses both
fulness and unity, Reason does not possess the unity and fulness of
Intelligence and Life. Consequently, Reason does not communicate the
totality and universality of its essence to the beings to which it
imparts itself. It, therefore, opposes its parts to each other, and
creates them defective; whereby, Reason constitutes and begets war and
struggle. Thus Reason is the universal unity, because it could not be
the absolute unity. Though reason imply struggle, because it consists
of parts, it also implies unity and harmony. It resembles the reason of
a drama, whose unity contains many diversities. In a drama, however,
the harmony of the whole results from its component contraries being
co-ordinated in the unity of action, while, in universal Reason, it is
from unity that the struggle of contraries arises. That is why we may
well compare universal Reason to the harmony formed by contrary sounds,
and to examine why the reasons of the beings also contain contraries.
In a concert, these reasons produce low and high sounds, and, by
virtue of the harmony, that constitutes their essence, they make these
divers sounds contribute to unity, that is, to Harmony[70] itself,
the supreme Reason of which they are only parts.[71] In the same way
we must consider other oppositions in the universe, such as black and
white, heat and cold, winged or walking animals, and reasonable and
irrational beings. All these things are parts of the single universal
Organism. Now if the parts of the universal Organism were often in
mutual disagreement, the universal Organism, nevertheless, remains
in perfect accord with itself because it is universal, and it is
universal by the Reason that inheres in it. The unity of this Reason
must therefore be composed of opposite reasons, because their very
opposition somehow constitutes its essence. If the Reason (of the
world) were not multiple, it would no longer be universal, and would
not even exist any longer. Since it exists, Reason must, therefore,
contain within itself some difference; and the greatest difference is
opposition. Now if Reason contain a difference, and produce different
things, the difference that exists in these things is greater than that
which exists in Reason. Now difference carried to the highest degree is
opposition. Therefore, to be perfect, Reason must from its very essence
produce things not only different, but even opposed.