The soul in its nature loves God and longs to be at one with Him in the noble love of a daughter for a noble father; but coming to human birth and lured by the courtships of this sphere, she takes up with another love, a mortal, leaves her father and falls.
Interpretation
The soul inherently seeks a connection with the divine but can become distracted by earthly desires.
In this quote, Plotinus explores the idea that the soul's true essence is to love and connect with the divine, likening this relationship to that of a loving daughter and her noble father. However, he points out that upon entering the physical realm, the soul may become enchanted by worldly attractions and mortal relationships, leading it away from its true source, resulting in a fall from grace.
In practice
This quote could be used in a spiritual discussion to illustrate the tension between divine aspiration and earthly distractions.
Beauty addresses itself chiefly to sight, but there is a beauty for the hearing too, as in certain combinations so words and in all kinds of music; for melodies and cadences are beautiful; and minds that lift themselves above the realm of sense to a higher order are aware of beauty in the conduct of life, in actions, in character, in the pursuits of the intellect; and there is the beauty of the virtues.
Knowledge, if it does not determine action, is dead to us.
The stars are like letters that inscribe themselves at every moment in the sky. Everything in the world is full of signs. All events are coordinated. All things depend on each other. Everything breathes together.
I am striving to give back the Divine in myself to the Divine in the All.
All things are filled full of signs, and it is a wise man who can learn about one thing from another.
The Soul of each one of us is sent, that the universe may be complete.
I am a child of God. I always carry that with me.
Great innovations should not be forced on slender majorities.
Let there be nothing within thee that is not very beautiful and very gentle, and there will be nothing without thee that is not beautiful and softened by the spell of thy presence.
Old age is like climbing a mountain. You climb from ledge to ledge. The higher you get, the more tired and breathless you become, but your views become more extensive.
Everybody wants to enjoy heaven after they die, but they don't want to be heavenly-minded while they live.
Examine then, and see if He be not the dispenser of kingdoms, who is Lord at once of the world which is ruled, and of man himself who rules; if He have not ordained the changes of dynasties, with their appointed seasons, who was before all time, and made the world a body of times; if the rise and the fall of states are not the work of Him, under whose sovereignty the human race once existed without states at all.
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