26. When incorporeal hypostatic substances descend, they split up
and multiply, their power weakening as they apply themselves to the
individual. When, on the contrary, they rise, they simplify, unite, and
their power intensifies.
27. In the life of incorporeal entities, the procession operates in a
manner such that the superior principle remains firm and substantial
in its nature, imparting its existence to what is below it, without
losing anything, or transforming itself into anything. Thus that which
receives existence does not receive existence with decay or alteration;
it is not begotten like generation (that is, the being of sense), which
participates in decay and change. It is, therefore, non-begotten and
incorruptible, because it is produced without generation or corruption.
28. Every begotten thing derives the cause of its generation from some
other (being); for nothing is begotten causelessly. But, among begotten
things, those which owe their being to a union of elements are on
that very account perishable. As to those which, not being composite,
owe their being to the simplicity of their hypostatic substances,
they are imperishable, inasmuch as they are indissoluble. When we say
that they are begotten, we do not mean that they are composite, but
only that they depend on some cause. Thus bodies are begotten doubly,
first because they depend on a cause, and then because they are
composite. Souls and intelligence, indeed, are begotten in the respect
that they depend on a cause; but not in the respect that they are
composite. Therefore, bodies, being doubly begotten, are dissoluble and
perishable. The Soul and Intelligence, being unbegotten in the sense
that they are not composite, are indissoluble and imperishable; for
they are begotten only in the sense that they depend on a cause.
29. Every principle that generates, by virtue of its "being," is
superior to the product it generates. Every generated being naturally
turns towards its generating principle. Of the generating principles,
some (the universal and perfect substances) do not turn towards their
product; while others (the substances that are individual, and subject
to conversion towards the manifold) partly turn towards their product,
and remain partly turned towards themselves; while others entirely turn
towards their product, and do not turn at all towards themselves.