Cause Principle Unity

On magic
approached him with humour and wit, after kissing his foot, that person
would be able to get from him whatever he wanted.
We might also consider the art of speaking and its type of spiritual bonding.
This occurs in songs and poems and in whatever orators do to persuade,
to dissuade and to move the emotions. The orators omit the other
parts of this art and try to hide them in the lap of magicians or philosophers
or those versed in politics. But Aristotle has covered most of it in his
Rhetorica ad Alexandrum, 27 where he organizes his considerations under
two headings. He examines first what the speaker needs and finds helpful,
and second what is pleasing and amusing in what he says or binds, by considering
his habits, status, conclusions and practices. But this is not the
place to recall and review all these matters.
Thirdly, the bondings arising from vision
The spirit is also bonded through vision, as has been said frequently above,
when various forms are observed by the eyes. As a result, active and passive
items of interest pass out from the eyes and enter into the eyes. As the
adage says, ‘I do not know whose eyes make lambs tender for me’. 28
Beautiful sights arouse feelings of love, and contrary sights bring feelings
of disgrace and hate. And the emotions of the soul and spirit bring
something additional to the body itself, which exists under the control of
the soul and the direction of the spirit. There are also other types of feelings
which come through the eyes and immediately affect the body for some
reason: sad expressions in other people make us sad and compassionate and
sorry for obvious reasons.
There are also worse impressions which enter the soul and the body, but
it is not evident how this happens and we are unable to judge the issue.
Nevertheless, they act very powerfully through various things which are in
us, that is, through a multitude of spirits and souls. Although one soul lives
in the whole body, and all the body’s members are controlled by one soul,
still the whole body and the whole soul and the parts of the universe are
vivified by a certain total spirit.
Hence, the explanation of many spiritual feelings must be found in
something else which lives and is conscious in us, and which is affected and
27 In 1587, Bruno wrote a commentary on this Aristotelian treatise under the title Explicatio rhetoricae
Aristotelis ad Alexandrum.
28 Virgil, Eclogues, III, 108.
137