Thus Essence reveals within itself all the Forms and universality. This
could not have been particular; for it could not be single, the double
presence of difference and identity demanding it to be simultaneously
one and many. Since, from its very origin, Essence is one and many, all
the species it contains must consequently simultaneously contain unity
and plurality, revealing dimensions, qualities, and different figures;
for it is impossible that Essence should lack anything, or should
not be complete universality; for it would no longer be universal,
if it were not complete. Life, therefore, penetrates every thing; is
everywhere present within it. Hence results that from that Life must
have been born all living organisms, for since matter and quality are
found within their bodies, these also are not lacking. Now, as all
living organisms are born within it, and have ever subsisted within it,
they were essentially embraced within eternity, yet, taken separately,
each of them is a different essence. Taken together they form a unity.
Consequently, the complex and synthetic totality of all these living
organisms is Intelligence, which, thus containing all (beings), is the
perfect and essential living Organism. When Intelligence allows itself
to be contemplated by what derives existence from it, Intelligence
appears thereto as the intelligible, and receives this predicate
properly and truly.[332]