all things
before all. From which testimonies the antiquity of this sublime doctrine
is sufficiently apparent.

And here it is necessary to observe that nearly all philosophers: prior
to Jamblichus (as we are informed by Damascius) asserted indeed, that
there is one superessential God, but that the other gods had an essential
subsistence, and were deified by illuminations from the one. They
likewise said that there is a multitude of super-essential unities, who
are not self-perfect subsistences, but illuminated unions with deity,
imparted to essences by the highest Gods. That this hypothesis, however,
is not conformable to the doctrine of Plato is evident from his
Parmenides, in which he shows that the one does not subsist in itself.
(See vol. iii, p. 133). For as we have observed from Proclus, in the
notes on that Dialogue, every thing which is the cause of itself and is
self-subsistent, is said to be in itself. Hence as producing power
always comprehends, according to cause that which it produces, it is
necessary that whatever produces itself should comprehend itself so far
as it is a cause, and should be comprehended by itself so far as it is
caused; and that it should be at once both cause and the thing caused,
that which comprehends, and that which is comprehended. If therefore a
subsistence in another signifies, according to Plato, the being produced
by another more excellent cause (as we have shown in the note to p. 133,
vol. iii), a subsistence in itself must signify that which is self-
begotten, and produced by itself. If the one therefore is not self-sub-
sistent as even transcending this mode of subsistence, and if it be
necessary that there should be something self-subsistent, it follows
that this must be the characteristic property of that which immediately
proceeds from the ineffable. But that there must be something self-
subsistent is evident, since unless this is admitted there will not
be a true sufficiency in any thing.

Besides, as Damascius well observes, if that which is subordinate by
nature is self-perfect, such as the human soul, much more will this be the
case with a divine soul. But if with soul, this also will be true of
intellect. And if it be true of intellect, it will also be true of life: if
of life, of being likewise; and if of being, of the unities above being.
For the self-perfect, the self-sufficient, and that which is established in
itself, will much more subsist in superior than in