[1] I shall give only one example, which is elementary in both senses
of the word. Ruysbroeck distinguishes three kinds of life--the active
life, the inward life, and the super-essential life. The Gnostics
distinguish the spirit, the soul, and the material life, and divide men
into three classes--the pneumatic or spiritual men, psychic or soul
men, and hylic or material men. Plotinus also distinguishes between the
soul, the intellect, the reasonable soul, and the animal nature. The
Zohar distinguishes the spirit, the soul, and the life of the senses,
and in the two systems, as in Ruysbroeck, the relation of the three
principles is explained by a _procession_ which is of the nature of an
_irradiation_; then the theory of the divine meeting, God coming into
us from within towards without, we going to Him from without towards
within, etc. Cf. also the 5th Ennead, etc. etc.