CAPÍTULO 3. SISTEMA DE SUPERVISIÓN
3.2 Requisitos de la aplicación
1-71), which is the main subject of his commentary.
Figure 1. MS Ricc. 92, fol. 1r. Incipit of Plato’s Symposium
In the next section of the codex (fols 72r-95v; 97r-104v), Ficino transcribes the Phaedrus. This is not surprising: the dialogue was traditionally considered as the text that complements the Symposium, the former focussing on Beauty, the
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latter on Love.116 Ficino explicitly draws on this tradition, when he states that the ʽSymposium de amore quidem precipue tractat, consequenter vero de pulchritudine. At Phaedrus gratia pulchritudinis disputat de amoreʼ.117
In MS Riccardianus 92, the Florentine scholar does not transcribe the full text of the dialogue, but selects two different sections. In the first one we find the following excerpts:
Table 1
116 Michael Allen has explored in detail the importance of the Phaedrus in Ficino’s De Amore,
stressing that ʽFicino thought of the two dialogues as natural twinsʼ. Michael J. B. Allen, ʽCosmogony and love: the role of Phaedrus in Ficino’s Symposium Commentaryʼ, Journal of
Medieval and Renaissance Studies 10 (1980), 131-153 (p. 134).
117ʽThe Symposium treats principally of love, and beauty as a consequence; but the Phaedrus talks
about love for beauty’s sakeʼ, in Allen, ʽCosmogony and loveʼ, p. 131.
Folium Excerpt Content
fols 72r-83v l.6 (Phaedr. 237 a4-245 b6) Socrates’ first speech on love
(237a4-243 e8)
Socrates’ second speech: the four kinds of divine madness (244a- 245b6)
Not transcribed in this section
245b7-249e3 Demonstration of the immortality of the soul
The chariot allegory
The hyperouranios, Zeus and his retinue, the immortal souls.
fol. 83v l. 7-95r (249 e4-257 c4) The madness of love: one comes to
sense love rising after seeing beauty on earth. Thanks to such beauty the lover is reminded of the Idea of true Beauty.
fol. 95r-95v l. 5 (265 a6-265c2) Summary of Socrates’ reasoning on
love
fol. 95v ll. 5- (279b 9-c 3) End of the dialogue: Prayer to Pan
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If we consider the table above, we notice that a long passage (Phaedr. 245b7-249e3) is missing.118 After transcribing Phaedr. 237 a4-245 b6, at fol. 83v Ficino writes the incipit of the passage (ἡµῖν δὲ ἀποδεικτέον 245b7) and the following note:
p(ro)lixa demo(n)stratio usque ad ὁ ἐρῶν τῶν καλῶν ἐραστὴς καλεῖται et cetera
quae tota e(st) i(n) ·*· p(ost) qua(m) ita sequitu(r).119
Figure 2. Detail of fol. 83v. Note concerning the omitted part
This note is followed by a transcription of Phaedr. 249e4-257 c4. In the note, Ficino states that the passage beginning with ἡµῖν δὲ ἀποδεικτέον (245b7) and ending with ὁ ἐρῶν τῶν καλῶν ἐραστὴς καλεῖται (249e3) contains a long (prolixa) demonstration on the immortality of the soul. Ficino transcribes further along the passage omitted, as indicated by a reference sign at fol. 97r, which is followed by a transcription of the omitted part.
118 In the table, the relevant section is emphasized in bold.
119 ʽ(There is) a long demonstration until ὁ ἐρῶν τῶν καλῶν ἐραστὴς καλεῖται etc., which is
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Figure 3. Detail of fol. 97r. The part that was previously omitted (Phaedr. 249e4-257 c4) is
copied in a separate section
Thus Ficino created two thematically separate and distinct sections: one on Socrates’ speeches on love, the other on the immortality of the soul. Since Phaedr. 249e4-257 c4 does not strictly concern Eros, the passage has been transcribed in an independent section. This also explain why Ficino transcribes Plato’s erotic epigrams at the end of the first section (fols 95v l.-fol. 96v): the poems are consistent with the topic of the section itself. They come immediately after the passage dealing with the prayer to Pan (Phaedr. 279b 9-c 3), because they belong to the same literary genre. In other words, Ficino arranged his material associatively and therefore used the same collecting criteria as excerptors, compilers and anthologists commonly used in transcribing selected passages and making up excerpta.120
As stated above, in Ficino’s commentary there is mention of Plato’s Phaedrus at various times. As the example below shows, in some cases the reference consists of a precise quotation:
120 On the method of arranging the material associatively, ‛in a way that invited sequential
reading’, see Blair, Too Much to Know, p. 40; See also Piccione ‛Scegliere, raccogliere e ordinare’, pp. 51-53; Francesca Maltomini, ʽLe antologie epigrammatiche: linee di trasmissione, metodi di creazione e meccanismi di fruizione dall'Ellenismo all'età bizantinaʼ, in Selecta colligere I, pp. 35- 46.
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Ideo livor, ut Plato inquit in Phedro, abest a divino choro (Phaedr. 247 a7).
Cum enim omnium iocundissimum sit re amata potiri, quilibet in eo potiundo quod
amat contentus plenusque vivit (De Amore IV, 6) 121
In other cases, the reference consists of sentences summarizing or commenting on passages of the dialogue, such as the following passage:
Cupidinis autem sagiptis cum omnes homines, tum quatuor maxime illorum genera vulnerantur. Nam animas Iovis, Phebi, Martis, Iunonis, id est, Veneris pedissequas
vulnerari potissimum Plato in Phedro significavit (Phaedr. 252 c3-253c). Easque
ab ipsis generationis primordiis ad amorem pronas, eos summopere homines amare solere, qui sub iisdem sint orti sideribus. Hinc Ioviales Iovialibus. Martialibus
Martiales atque aliis similiter alii vehementer afficiuntur (De Amore VI, 5).122
As pointed out above, Ficino created two interconnected sections, dealing with the four kinds of divine madness, and the famous chariot allegory (Phaedr. 245c-249d) respectively. This is not a coincidence: I would argue that these passages are key to the main argument of the De Amore.
According to Ficino, the universe consists of a hierarchy of being extending from God (the One) to the physical world (Matter / multiplicity). As such, the universe consists of degrees (hypostases) of decreasing perfection: Mind, Soul, Nature and Matter.123 In this system, each being is involved in a process of emanation from God and desires to rise to the level above it in an
121 I emphasized the quotation in the text: ʽTherefore Envy, as Plato says in the Phaedrus, is
absent from the divine chorus. For, since the most pleasing of all things is to achieve the beloved thing, anyone lives content and satisfied in possessing that which he lovesʼ, trans. by Jayne in Ficino, Commentary, p. 80.
122ʽNot only all men, but especially four kinds of men are wounded by Cupid’s arrows. For Plato
points out in the Phaedrus that souls which are followers of Jupiter, Apollo, Mars and Juno (that is, Venus) are wounded the most. And that being disposed to love from the very beginnings of their creation, they are accustomed to love especially those men who are born under the same stars. Hence Jovians are strongly affected by Jovians, Martians by Martians, and similarly the others by the othersʼ, trans. by Jayne in Ficino, Commentary, ed. by Jayne, p. 113.
123 See Paul Oskar Kristeller, Il pensiero filosofico di Marsilio Ficino (Florence: Casa Editrice Le
Lettere, 1988), pp. 66-123; See also Panofsky, Studies in Iconology, pp. 132-138; Ficino,
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ascending return to God.124. This desire is called love, and the quality in the source which stirs this desire is called beauty. As part of the hierarchy, the human soul is involved in this process. The process of return is performed through the four kinds of divine madness: poetic, hieratic, prophetic, and erotic. The chariot allegory, a passage from the Phaedrus that Ficino analyses at various times in his works, and transcribes in his notebook, represents the paradigm for the supra- rational ascent of the soul.125