If the universal Soul communicate herself to all individual animals,
and if it be in this sense that each soul is a part of the universal
Soul--for as soon as she would be divided, the universal Soul
could not communicate herself to every part--the universal must be
entire everywhere, and she must simultaneously be one and the same
in different beings. Now this hypothesis no longer permits us to
distinguish on one hand the universal Soul, and on the other the parts
of this soul, so much the more as these parts have the same power (as
the universal Soul); for even for organs whose functions are different,
as the eyes and ears, it will not be claimed that there is one part of
the soul in the eyes, and another in the ears--such a division would
suit only things that have no relation with the soul. We should insist
that it is the same part of the soul which animates these two different
organs, exercising in each of them a different faculty. Indeed, all
the powers of the soul are present in these two senses (of sight and
hearing), and the only cause of the difference of their perceptions is
the differences of the organs. Nevertheless all perceptions belong to
forms (that is, to faculties of the soul), and reduce to a form (the
soul) which can become all things (?).[153] This is further proved by
the fact that the impressions are forced to come and centre in an only
centre. Doubtless the organs by means of which we perceive cannot make
us perceive all things, and consequently the impressions differ with
the organs. Nevertheless the judgment of these impressions belongs to
one and the same principle, which resembles a judge attentive to the
words and acts submitted to his consideration.[105] We have, however,
said above that it is one and the same principle which produces acts
belonging to different functions (as are sight and hearing). If these
functions be like the senses, it is not possible that each of them
should think; for the universal alone would be capable of this. If
thought be a special independent function, every intelligence subsists
by itself. Further, when the soul is reasonable, and when she is so in
a way such as to be called reasonable in her entirety, that which is
called a part conforms to the whole, and consequently is not a part of
the whole.