4. There are individual souls which, in their conversion[169] towards
the principle from which they proceed, aspire to the intelligible
world, and which also exercise their power on inferior things, just
as light, which does not disdain to throw its rays down to us though
remaining suspended to the sun on high. These souls must remain
sheltered from all suffering so long as in the intelligible world they
remain together with the universal Soul. They must besides, in heaven,
share with it the administration of the world; like kings who, being
colleagues of the great King of the universe, share the government with
Him, without themselves descending from their thrones, without ceasing
to occupy a place as elevated as He. But when they pass from this
state in which they live with the universal Soul to a particular and
independent existence, when they seem weary of dwelling with another,
then each of them returns to what belongs to her individually. Now
when a soul has done that for a long while, when she withdraws from
the universal Soul, and distinguishes herself therefrom, when she
ceases to keep her glances directed towards the intelligible world;
then, isolating herself in her individual existence, she weakens, and
finds herself overwhelmed with a crowd of cares, because she directs
her glance at something individual. Having therefore separated herself
from the universal Soul as well as from the other souls that remain
united thereto, and having attached herself to an individual body, and
concentrating herself exclusively on this object, which is subjected to
the destructive action of all other beings, she ceases to govern the
whole to administer more carefully a part, the care of which forces
her to busy herself, and mingle with external things, to be not only
present in the body, but also to interpenetrate it.