Participating in Form

Reading Plotinus, treatise I.6[1]. On Beauty. Part II.

I. §I.6.2.

I.1 In the presence of Being

“To be beautiful, a living creature, and every whole made up of parts, must not only present a certain order in its arrangement of parts, but also be of a certain definite magnitude. Beauty is a matter of size and order.”

(Aristotle, Poetics, 1450b34-35)

This is the classical view on beauty, that it consists in a certain order in the arrangements of parts. And although Plotinus will not deny that such order or symmetry plays a role in constituting the beautiful, he will deny that beauty can only be found in symmetry and order between parts. We saw that there are many problems with this view, the whole would be beautiful, but how can something be beautiful if its parts are not? There are evidently simple things that are also beautiful, a single color for example, or the light of the sun. And how, if beauty is symmetry, do you explain that sometimes a less-ordered face is more beautiful than a more ordered face? For example when someone with a perfectly ordered face has a depressed look on his face, and someone else with a slightly less ordered face has a very vital look. Beauty cannot consist entirely in symmetry, it must be something else, that often shines through symmetry, but is not itself symmetry. 

When we encounter something beautiful, the soul is naturally drawn to it. And when we encounter something ugly, the soul naturally draws itself away. This observation makes Plotinus say that in beauty there is always recognition, because like is drawn to like. Thus, in seeing something beautiful, the soul recognizes itself. And this must mean that the soul itself, or a part of it, is beautiful. This is Plotinus’ claim. We read: 

“We indeed say that the soul, having the nature it does, and finding itself among Beings in the presence of the greater Substantiality, when it sees something to which it has a kinship or something that is a trace of that to which it has a kinship, is both delighted and thrilled and returns to itself and recollects itself and what belongs to itself.”

(Plotinus, I.6.2 6-10)

What Plotinus is saying here is that because the soul finds itself among the presence of Being and Substantiality, which are beautiful, it can recognize beauty in other things. Being and Substantiality are always present to the soul, always known to the soul. And when the soul encounters something beautiful in the world, a painting, a sculpture, or a person, the soul finds this thing beautiful because it recognizes Being in it, which it can only recognize because it itself was already in the presence of Being. In other words, when we see something beautiful, this is beautiful because Being shines through in it. And thus, through physical beauty, art, virtuous action, etc, the things in this world —objects, people, natural phenomena, colours, etc— can make Being present to our senses.

I.2. Plotinus’ system

What is Being? When Plotinus speaks of Being here with a capital B, he is talking about the Being of the Intelligible world. 

In Plotinus’ ontology, there are said to be three existents. First there is the One, this is the source and origin of all there is, and as source it encapsulates all there is. Out of the One it is said that Intellect or Nous emerges. This is the Intelligible realm that Plotinus was speaking about. In Intellect there are no differences between things, no separation, and it is said that Intellect thinks itself as self-thinking thought. It is entirely present to itself. This is different from how we usually think. In our life, we are seldom entirely present to ourselves. Rather, we are present to things other than ourselves. Right now, I might be faintly conscious of myself, but I am also conscious of this computer in front of me, of the air touching my skin, of the sounds of cars in the distance. In short, my consciousness or thought is intentional; it is conscious of something other than itself. In Intellect however, thought thinks itself. And it is out of the activity of thought of this self-thinking thought that Soul emerges. This Soul resides in the Intelligible realm, and out of this one Soul there emanates the soul of nature on the one hand, and many different individual souls on the other hand. You and I are such individual souls. And it is out of Soul that the lowest reality emerges: matter, which is also identified as indeterminacy and non-Being.  

It is important to know that this succession of realities, from the One through Intellect and Soul, and to matter, is not a temporal succession. It is a-temporal and explains the structure of reality. What this means is that we as individual souls are never really separated from Intellect and the One. It might seem like it, but this is only because we lack consciousness of it. For in fact, because we emanate from Intellect and the One, and because as non-temporal realities they inhere in us, they are our essence. 

This is the framework of Plotinus’ thought, and when he speaks of Being, this is a designation for the life of Intellect, which is entirely identified with Being. Matter on the other hand is designated as non-being. We, as individual souls, live a sort of ‘amphibian’ life, with one foot we are situated in matter, and with the other we are connected to Intellect. We live, between Being and non-Being. 

I.3. Being and Beauty

This Being, the realm of Intellect, is identified with Beauty. And, because we come from Intellect and the One, our essence still carries our lineage with it. When we see something beautiful, we can recognize the greater beauty of Being in it, because in our deepest essence, we too are Beauty itself.

There is thus a ‘sameness’ in beauty, between the things here and the intelligible world. There is beauty to be seen here, and we recognize it as beauty because there is a sameness of this beauty with the beauty of Intellect. What constitutes this sameness, what principle guarantees that things both here and in Intellect are beautiful?

“We say that these are beautiful by participation in Form.”

(I.6.2. 14)

Plotinus means to say that for there to be beauty, there must be Form. What is Form? In the intelligible realm, Intellect thinks itself, and the actualization of this thinking constitutes what are called the Forms. It can be said that the thoughts of Intellect are the Forms. But the way in which Intellect grasps its ‘thoughts’, the Forms, is not in the same manner in which we think certain things. When I think about this computer in front of me, when I have a thought of it, there is a clear separation between me and the object of my thought. This separation between subject and object, this fact of intentionality —that thought is always thinking about something other than itself—, is however not to be found in Intellect. Here, thought thinks itself, and it is because thought thinks itself, that the Forms emerge. In other words, Intellect does not think about Forms as things separate from itself. Rather, the Forms are organically born from Intellect’s natural activity of thinking itself. 

Now, what are these Forms? These are none other than the Ideas or Forms that Plato postulated to explain the origin of what we see in the world. For example, for Plato there must be a Form of justice, which explains the fact that we observe just acts. Why? I observe someone acting in a certain way, and I say he acts justly. And I see someone else acting in a similar way, and here too, I say there is justice. In both of these cases I say there is justice. But the ‘justice’ displayed in both of these cases is imperfect, it is mixed in with the more depraved characters of the men acting justly. And both of these cases are very different, yet in both of them I say there is justice. How can this be? Plato says that there must be a ‘Form of justice’ somewhere, in which both instances of imperfect justice participate, which both of these instances express, but never fully. For justice can only be fully present in justice itself —which is the Form of justice.

It is the same with Beauty. If you recall our previous post, following Plato’s Symposium, Plotinus encouraged us to look at many different instances of beauty. There is beauty in this body, there is beauty in this painting, there is beauty in this behaviour, etc. And we tried to grasp what it is in all of these cases that makes them beautiful. Beauty is present in all of them, so what is it that is the same in all of them that makes them beautiful? We can then come up with all sorts of theories: ‘it must be the presence of symmetry’, ‘it must be a certain color’, ‘it must be that a certain meaning is expressed.’ But for every theory about beauty we come up with, we can find cases of beauty that discredit the theory. Until we are left with nothing to say but ‘the beautiful is beautiful because of the presence of the beautiful.’ This beauty that is then present in all cases of beauty, and is explained only through itself —not through something other than itself; symmetry, colour, etc.— this is the Form of beauty, Beauty in and by itself. In this way, all the particular instances of things that we see in this world, are only particular expressions of a Form that is itself unchanging and explained entirely by itself. All these particular expressions of beauty for example, they are beautiful because they participate in Beauty as Form. So, when Plotinus now says that things are beautiful by participation in Form, this is what he means —Intellect thinks Forms, and we recognize beautiful things because these things participate in the Form of Beauty. And how can we recognize these things in the first place? Because in our deepest essence, Intellect inheres in us, because we as a soul emanate from Intellect. 

I.4. In-Forming matter

It is thus the presence of Form that makes something beautiful. And reversely:

“everything that is shapeless but is by nature capable of receiving shape or form, having no share in a expressed principle or from, is ugly, and stands outside divine reason. This is complete ugliness.”

(I.6.2. 15)

If the presence of Form ensures beauty, then its absence will make something ugly. And consequently, the more we participate in Form, the more we are made beautiful. And the less we participate in Form, the more ugly we will be. The lower we go in the chain of being, the less Form there is. In the intelligible realm, the Forms are present as they are, fully. But in the lower realm of individual souls, there is only participation in the intelligible Forms. For example, no individual soul can ever fully embody the Form ‘justice’, but we can act justly. As an individual soul, we can only become like the Form of justice by approximation. And at the lowest point of the chain of being, there is matter, which Plotinus defines as complete indeterminacy, lack, and even as non-Being. But because soul ‘descends’ from the intelligible realm into matter, we seldom encounter matter as such, entirely indeterminate. Most of the time, we encounter matter already informed by Form through the participation in Forms displayed by the soul of nature, and by individual souls. In this way, the material cosmos becomes shaped and moulded according to form, and can too come to express the Beauty of the Intelligible realm. In many ways, the purpose of us as individual souls is to enact this process, to inform matter with Beauty through our own participation in Forms. For example, if we act justly, we participate in the Form of justice, thus moulding our actions in accordance with justice. And in this way, we make the splendour of Being shine forth in our actions. And if we create a beautiful statue, we can make raw matter participate in the beauty of the intelligible realm.

For Plotinus, this is our task; to get to know the intelligible realm, and to inform the material realm with what we have come to know about our Divine lineage. In this way, the entirety of reality can be shaped in accordance with its ultimate principle; Intellect, and the One. So that reality might come to express its own essence more fully.  How does Form shape matter? We read:

“The form, then, approaches the matter and organizes what is going to be a single composite made from many parts, and guides it into being a completed unity, and makes it one by the parts’ acceptance of this; and since the form is one, that which is shaped had to be one, to the extent possible for that which is composed of many parts.”

(I.6.2. 20)

Matter is indeterminate, it is chaos, and characterized by the dis-order that it displays. We can get an idea of this by looking at our material bodies. Our appetite wants this, some other desire wants that, our thirst wants that, and in this way we are dragged from here to there by all sorts of opposing desires. It is a mess, or at least it can be. And thus, the soul gives form to the disparate urges of matter, guiding them in one chosen direction, in accordance with Forms. It ensures that the different desires of the parts accept their role in one overarching direction. And in this way, the disarray and chaos is silenced, and the body can act as one whole. 

I.5. Guiding matter home

It is interesting here that Plotinus says that the form “guides” the parts into a completed unity. It doesn’t force, no, it guides. When we read Plotinus, it is easy to see him as someone who despised the material world and the senses, someone who wants you to fight your body and fight the material world. This is not the case. You should not fight the matter to which you are attached, rather, you should guide it. What does this mean? Could this mean that in a sense matter is already wanting to go in the right direction, only needing someone to guide it in the right direction? Plotinus seems to affirm this at Ennead II.4, when he says that matter is characterized by pure want, it is pure absence of form, and as such, it is pure desire for form. (II.4.16. 19-20) This claim is affirmed in Ennead III.6., where we read that matter “makes a violent attempt to seize it [the producer of matter, i.e. soul] by its presence, audacity and a kind of begging and poverty.”(III.6.14. 6-9) Here, Plotinus relies on the view laid out in Plato’s Symposium, that matter is Poverty and characterized by an incessant begging.(Plato, Symposium, 203b) Matter, being Poverty, begs for what it does not have: the riches of Being. And who is it that matter begs to? This is the level of reality directly above it; soul. And thus, as individual souls, we are trapped between the plenty of Being, and the Poverty of matter. Trying to listen to our Intelligible lineage, but also being forced to listen to the begging of matter. 

This would make sense, for in Plotinus’ metaphysics, every level of reality desires to be at one with the higher level of reality that came before. The One, being the first in line, desires nothing but itself. And out of this ‘self-love’ comes Intellect. Intellect desires to be at one with the One, and out this process of contemplating what came before it, Intellect produces Soul. And Soul, loving and contemplating the Intelligible realm and its Forms, is able to shape the material world. And the material world would then desire to be informed. It is pure indeterminacy, pure lack, absence of form. But being like this, its desire to become informed must be enormous. It is he who feels the least loved, who wants to be loved the most. It is like this with matter, it wants to be formed, to be guided, and so fearful of not receiving this formation from Soul, it constantly shouts at Soul, asking, begging, for its help. All the parts of reality, the highest and the lowest, sing the praise of the One. Even if the voice in which it speaks is a voice of anguish or fear. He who bursts out in anger the most, is he who secretly desires love the most. And in this way, because it is most lacking in Being, matter screams most fiercely for it. When we are dragged from here to there by our bodily desires, our cravings asking of us to fulfil them, our hatred asking of us to be acted out, we should not shut them out. Rather, Plotinus says, we should listen to them, and ask what they are trying to tell us. Even the most destructive and despicable of desires, even these disguise a desire for the One. And the task of the individual souls, is to guide the desires of matter in the right direction. The problem is that matter, being identified with confusion, and lacking the forms that make things intelligible, doesn’t know how to achieve union with what it desires the most —Being. And hence, it will seek its fulfilment in all the wrong places. It thinks it can find Being in wickedness, in the endless gratification of immediate sense-pleasure, in getting love from other people, et cetera. Plotinus says that “the beggar[here signifying matter] asks not for what the giver has, but is in love with whatever he can get.”(III.6.13. 14) Matter does not know what it can reasonably ask of us, rather, it wants everything, even if this means our own destruction. Its desire is characterized by excess, and a desiring to take wherever there is something to take. Hence, we should guide it, and tame it. So that we are not a slave to it, but so that it can become a servant for us. A servant treated well, who we welcome with us on the path to Being. 

This process is applicable to our own material body, but also to how the sculptor engages with stone or marble, and to all other such cases in which soul and matter come into contact with each other.

And when we have been able to bring the parts of matter into harmony, when we have guided them in the right direction, showing them the right way towards union, it is then that Beauty can appear. We read: 

“Beauty is, then, situated over that which is shaped at the moment when, the parts having been arranged into one whole, it gives itself to the parts and to the wholes. Whenever beauty takes hold of something that is one and uniform in its parts, it gives the identical thing to the whole. It is, in a way, like craftsmanship, that sometimes gives beauty to a whole house along with its parts, but sometimes it is like the particular nature that gives beauty to a single stone. Thus, a body actually comes to be beautiful by its association with an expressed principle coming from divine Forms.”

(I.6.2. 25-30)

As we saw in our previous post, Beauty is not the same as harmony or symmetry between parts. As Plotinus says:

“Beauty is that which shines from symmetry, rather than the symmetry itself; this is what is loveable. For why is there more light of beauty in a living face, and just its trace in a dead face, even if the face has not decayed in its flesh and symmetry? And living beings are more beautiful than statues, even if the latter are more symmetrical.”

(VI.7.22. 25-30)

It is when things are shaped, that beauty can shine through the created symmetrical whole. But Beauty itself is not identical to this whole or this symmetry, rather Beauty is “situated over that which is shaped.” This shaping by form, does not equate to the arranging of parts to make a beautiful symmetrical whole. For Beauty can become present in both a composite, and also in something simple.

“It is, in a way, like craftsmanship, that sometimes gives beauty to a whole house along with its parts, but sometimes it is like the particular nature that gives beauty to a single stone.”

(I.6.2.) 

With this, we have explained how Beauty comes to be in this world. Through Form shaping matter, through Soul guiding matter along the roads of Beauty. And it is when this happens, that we, as Soul, can recognize Beauty in what we see with our eyes, hear with our ears, and understand with our minds. And this is so, because we ourselves are Beauty in our deepest essence. For in truth, we belong to the Intelligible world, only having become separated from this Being that is Beauty, so that we can share this Beauty with what desires it most: matter, and its tormenting wish to be reunited with its ultimate essence: the One. In creating beauty, we heal the world. In making matter participate in Beauty, we reunite reality with itself. 

Sources:

Aristotle, The Complete Works Volume II. Edited by Jonathan Barnes. Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1984.

Plato. Complete Works. Edited by John M. Cooper. Cambridge: Hackett, 1997.

Plotinus, The Enneads. Edited by Lloyd P. Gerson. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2018.