12. When a sound resounds in the air, and when it constitutes a word,
the ear that is present hears and perceives this sound and this word,
especially if the place be quiet. If another ear should come to be in
this place, the sound and the word approach it likewise, or rather,
this ear will approach the word. Suppose also that several eyes
consider the same object; all are filled with its sight, although
this object occupy a determinate place. Thus the same object will
impress different organs with different perceptions, because the
one is an eye, and the other is an ear. Likewise, all the things
that can participate in the soul do participate therein, but each
receives a different power from one and the same principle. The sound
is everywhere present in the air; it is not a divided unity, but a
unity present everywhere, entirely. Likewise, if the air receive the
form of the visible object, it possesses it without division, for, in
whatever place the eye should place itself, it perceives the form of
the visible object; at, least, according to our opinion, for not all
philosophers agree herewith. We give these examples to explain how
several things may participate in one and the same principle. Besides,
the example of the sound suffices to demonstrate what we here wish to
explain; namely, that the entire form is present in the entire air;
for all men would not hear the same thing, if the word uttered by the
sound were everywhere entire, and if each ear did not likewise hear it
entire. Now if in this case the entire word spread in the entire air,
without some definite part of the word being united to a certain part
of the air, and some other part of the word being united with another
part of the air, how could we refuse to admit that a single Soul
penetrates everywhere without dividing herself with the things, that
she is entirely present everywhere where she is, that she is everywhere
in the world without dividing into parts that correspond to those of
the world? When she has united with the bodies, in whatever kind of
union, she bears an analogy to the word which has been pronounced in
the air, while before uniting with the bodies, she resembles him who
pronounces, or is about to pronounce some word. Nevertheless, even when
she has united to the bodies, she does not really in certain respects
cease resembling him who pronounces a word, and who, while pronouncing
it, possesses it, and gives it at the same time. Doubtless the word
does not have a nature identical with those things that we proposed to
illustrate by this example; nevertheless, there is much analogy between
them.