Cause Principle Unity

Second dialogue
DICSONO. So that, in some way, you allow Anaxagoras’ notion, who
qualifies with the word ‘latent’ the particular forms of nature, and you
approve, in part, that of Plato, who has them derive from ideas, and, in part,
that of Empedocles, who has them issue from the intelligence, and, in
certain measure, that of Aristotle, who puts them down as emerging, so to
speak, from the potency of matter?
TEOFILO. Yes, for as we have said, where there is form, there is, in a
way, everything. Where there is soul, spirit, life, there is everything. The
one who forms is the intellect, which acts through the ideal species; even
if it does not bring forms out of matter, it does not then look for them
outside of matter, since this spirit fills everything.
POLIINNIO. Velim scire quomodo forma est anima mundi ubique tota [I
would like very much to know how the world soul is a form which is present
everywhere in its totality], if it is indivisible. It must, then, be very
large, even of infinite dimension, since you say the world is infinite.
GERVASIO. Here is good reason, indeed, for its being large. It is like
what a preacher at Grandazzo in Sicily said of our Lord: to signify that he
is present everywhere, he ordered a crucifix as large as the church, in the
image of God the Father, who has the heavens for a canopy and the starry
sky for a seat, and who possesses such long legs that they stretch down to
earth, which he uses as a footstool. To this preacher came a certain peasant,
saying, ‘Reverend father, how many ells of cloth would it take to make
his hose?’ Another said that all Melazzo and Nicosia’s chickpeas, haricots
and broad beans would not suffice to fill his belly. Be careful, then, that this
world soul is not cut out the same way.
TEOFILO. I would not know how to satisfy your perplexity, Gervasio,
but I can that of Master Poliinnio. But for both of you, I will use a comparison,
for I want you, too, to gather some fruit from our reasonings and
discussions. In short, you must know, then, that the world soul and the
divinity are not present entirely everywhere and through every part, in the
same way as some material thing could be – since that is impossible for any
body or spirit of any kind whatsoever – but are present in a manner that is
not easy to explain, save in the following way. Please note that if we say the
world soul and universal form are everywhere, we do not mean in a corporeal
or dimensional sense, for they are not of that nature and cannot be found
so in any part. They are everywhere present in their entirety in a spiritual
way. To take an example (crude as it is), you might imagine a voice which
is entire inside the whole room, and in every part of it: in effect, one hears
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