42. When you are in doubt about this matter, and when you wonder how
you should classify these attributes to which reasoning has brought
you, reject from among the things of the second order what seems
venerable; attribute to the First none of the things that belong to the
second order; neither attribute to those of the second order (that is,
to Intelligence), what belongs to those of the third (that is, to the
Soul); but subsume under the first Principle the things of the second
order, and under the second principle the things of the third. That
is the true means of allowing each being to preserve its nature, and
at the same time to point out the bond that connects the lower things
with the higher, and showing thus that the inferior things depend on
the superior ones, while the superior ones remain in themselves. That
is why (Plato) was right in saying,[161] "All things surround the King
of all, and exist on his account." "All things" means "all beings."
"All things exist on his account" means that He is the cause of their
existence, and the object of their desire, because His nature is
different from theirs, because in Him is nothing that is in them, since
they could not exist if the First possessed some attribute of what is
inferior to Him. Therefore, if Intelligence be comprised within what
is meant by "all things," it could not belong to the First. When (in
the same place Plato calls the divinity) "the cause of all beauty,"
he seems to classify beauty among the Ideas, and the Good above the
universal beauty.[162] After thus having assigned the intelligible
(entities) to the second rank, he classifies, as dependent on them,
the things of the third order, which follow them. Last, to that which
occupies the third rank, to the universal Soul, he subsumes the world
that is derived therefrom. As the Soul depends on the Intelligence, and
as Intelligence depends on the Good, all things thus depend from the
Good in different degrees, mediately or immediately. In this respect,
the things which are the most distant from the Good are the objects of
sense, which are subsumed under the Soul.