Page:Works of Plato his first fifty-five dialogues (Taylor 1804) (Vol 2 of 5) (IA Vol2worksofplato00plat).pdf/424



ethers as the cauſes of the phenomena, as we are informed by Socrates in the Phædo. But the moſt accurate of thoſe poſterior to Plato, (ſuch as the more early peripatetics,) contemplating matter in conjunction with form, conſidered theſe as the principles of bodies; and if at any time they mention a producing cauſe, as when they call nature a principle of motion, they rather take away than eſtabliſh his efficacious and producing prerogative, while they do not allow that he contains the reaſons of his productions, but admit that many things are the progeny of chance. But Plato, following the Pythagoreans, delivers as the concauſes of natural things, an all-receiving matter, and a material form, as ſubſervient to proper cauſes in generation; but, prior to theſe, he inveſtigates primary cauſes, i. e. the producing, the paradigmatical, and the final.

Hence, he places over the univerſe a demiurgic intellect and an intelligible cauſe; in which laſt the univerſe and goodneſs have a primary ſubſiſtence, and which is eſtabliſhed above the artificer of things in the order of the deſirable, or, in other words, is a ſuperior object of deſire. For, ſince that which is moved by another, or a corporeal nature, is ſuſpended from a motive power, and is naturally incapable either of producing, perfecting, or preſerving itſelf, it evidently requires a fabricative cauſe for the commencement and continuance of its being. The concauſes, therefore, of natural productions muſt neceſſarily be ſuſpended from true cauſes, as the ſources of their exiſtence, and for the ſake of which they were fabricated by the father of all things. With great propriety, therefore, are all theſe accurately explored by Plato, and likewiſe the two depending from theſe, viz. form, and the ſubject matter. For this world is not the ſame with the intelligible and intellectual worlds, which are ſelf-ſubſiſtent, and conſequently by no means indigent of a ſubject, but it is a compoſite of matter and form. However, as it perpetually depends on theſe, like the ſhadow from the forming ſubſtance, Plato aſſimilates it to intelligible animal itſelf; evinces that it is a God through its participation of good, and perfectly defines the whole world to be a bleſſed God, participating of intellect and ſoul. Such, then, being Plato's deſign in the Timæus, he very properly in the beginning exhibits, through images, the order of the univerſe; for it is