The mundane Gods, or those divinities who give completion to the sensible world, are assigned the last order of deific progression, as we are informed by Plato in the preceding book. They also divide the universe, and obtain perpetual allotments and receptacles in it, and through these weave one and the best polity of the universe. Each of the mundane genera likewise enjoy the energy of the liberated governors of the universe, according to a measure adapted to each, and especially such as are able to follow the powers of these Gods. 
   For in the Gods themselves we may perceive a twofold energy, the one indeed being co-arranged with the subjects of their providential care, but the other being exempt and separate. According, therefore, to the first of these energies, the mundane Gods govern sensibles, and convolve and convert them to themselves; but according to the other, they follow the liberated Gods, and together with them are elevated to an intelligible nature. 
 

   The mundane Gods also perfectly unfold the psychical peculiarity into light; and receive the illuminations of all the divinities prior to them. Hence too, they rule over the universe imitating the liberated Gods, adorn sublunary natures with forms, and assimilate them to intellectual paradigms, imitating the ruling Gods. They likewise pour forth the whole of the life which is inseparable from body, from the one fountain of souls, establishing it as an image of the life which is separate from a corporeal nature, and unite themselves to this fountain.

   Again, the world is said by Plato in the Timaeus to be the image of the eternal, i.e. of the intelligible Gods. For it is filled from them with deity, and the progressions into it of the mundane Gods, are as it were certain rivers and illuminations of the intelligible Gods. 
   These progressions also the world receives, not only according to the celestial part of it, but according to the whole of itself. 
   For in the air, the earth and sea, there are advents of terrestrial, aquatic, and aerial Gods. Hence the world is throughout filled with deity; and on this account is according to the whole of itself the image of the intelligible Gods. 
   Not that it receives indeed these Gods themselves; for images do not receive the exempt essences of the total Gods; but illuminations poured from thence on the secondary orders, to the reception of which they are commensurate.

   Farther still, of the mundane Gods, some are the causes of the existence of the world; others animate it; others again harmonize it thus composed of different natures; and others, lastly, guard and preserve it when harmonically arranged. And since these orders are four, and each consists of things first, middle and last, it is necessary that the disposers of these should be twelve. Hence Jupiter, Neptune, and Vulcan, fabricate the world; Ceres, Juno and Diana animate it; Mercury, Venus, and Apollo harmonize it; and lastly, Vesta, Minerva, and Mars, preside over it with a guardian power. 
 

   But the truth of this may be seen in statues as in enigmas. For Apollo harmonizes the lyre; Pallas is invested with arms; and Venus is naked; since harmony generates beauty, and beauty is not concealed in objects of sensible inspection. 
   Since, however, these Gods primarily possess the world, it is necessary to consider the other mundane Gods as subsisting in these; as Bacchus in Jupiter, Esculapius in Apollo, and the Graces in Venus. 
   We may likewise, behold the spheres with which they are connected; viz. Vesta with earth, Neptune with water, Juno with air, and Vulcan with fire. But the six superior Gods we denominate from general custom. For Apollo and Diana are assumed for the sun and moon; but the orb of Saturn is attributed to Ceres; aether to Pallas; and heaven is common to them all. And thus much concerning the mundane Gods in general, the sources of their progression, their orders, powers, and spheres.
 

   The division, however, of the mundane Gods is into the celestial and sublunary. And of the celestial, the divinity of the inerratic sphere has the relation of a monad to the divinities of the planets. But the triad under this monad consists of Saturn, Jupiter, and Mars; of which the first is the cause of connected comprehension, the second of symmetry, and the third of division and separation. 
 

   And again, with respect to the sublunary deities, the moon ranks as a monad, being the cause of all generation and corruption. But the triad under it, consists of the divinities who preside over the elements of air, water and earth. 
 

   Between these are the planets that revolve with an equal velocity. And of these, the sun indeed unfolds truth into light, Venus beauty, and Mercury the symmetry of reasons or productive principles, conformably to the analogy of the three monads mentioned by Plato in the Philebus, as subsisting in the vestibule of The Good. 
 

   It may also be said that the moon is the cause of nature to the mortal genera, being the visible image of the fontal nature existing in the goddess Rhea. But the sun is the fabricator of all the senses, because he is the author of seeing and of being seen. Mercury is the cause of the motions of the phantasy; for the sun gives subsistence to the essence of the phantasy, so far as it is the same with sense. But Venus is the cause of the appetites of that irrational part of the soul which is called desire; and Mars, of those irascible motions which are conformable to nature. Jupiter also, is the common cause of all vital, and Saturn of all gnostic powers. 
 

   For all the irrational forms may be divided into these. The causes, therefore, of these, are antecedently comprehended in the celestial Gods, and in the spheres with which they are connected.

   The allotments also of the mundane Gods are conformable to the divisions of the universe. But the universe is divided by demiurgic numbers, viz. by the duad, triad, tetrad, pentad, hebdomad, and dodecad. 
 

   For after the one fabrication of things by the demiurgus, the division of the universe into two parts, heaven and generation (or the sublunary region), gives subsistence to twofold allotments, the celestial and the sublunary. 
   After this, the triad divides the universe, to which Homer alludes when he says that Neptune is allotted the hoary deep, Jupiter, the extended heavens, and Pluto, the subterranean darkness. 
   But after the triple distribution, the tetradic follows, which gives a fourfold arrangement to the elements in the universe, as the Pythagoreans say, viz. the celestial and the ethereal, above the earth and under the earth. 
   The universe also receives a division into five parts. For the world is one and quintuple, and is appropriately divided by celestial, empyreal, aerial, aquatic and terrestrial figures and presiding Gods. 
   After this follows its division into seven parts. For the heptad beginning supernally from the inerratic sphere, pervades through all the elements. 
   And in the last place is the division of the universe by the dodecad, viz. into the sphere of the fixed stars, the spheres of the seven planets, and the spheres of the four elements.

   Moreover, the allotment of angels and daemons is co-suspended from the divine allotments, but has a more various distribution. 
   For one divine allotment comprehends in itself many angelic, and a still greater number of daemoniacal allotments; since every angel rules over many daemons, and every angelic allotment is surrounded with numerous daemoniacal allotments. For what a monad is in the Gods, that a tribe is among daemons. 
   Here, therefore, instead of the triad we must assume three compositions, and instead of the tetrad or dodecad, four or twelve choirs following their respective leaders. And thus we shall always preserve the higher allotments. 
   For as in essences, powers and energies, progressions generate multitude; thus also in allotments, such as are first, have a precedency in power, but are diminished in multitude, as being nearer to the one father of the universe, and the whole and one providence which extends to all things. But secondary allotments, have a diminution of power, but an increase of multitude. And thus much concerning allotments in general.

   Since, however, according to a division of the universe into two parts, we have distributed allotments into the celestial and sublunary, there can be no doubt what the former are, and whether they possess an invariable sameness of subsistence. 
   But the sublunary allotments are deservedly a subject of admiration, whether they are said to be perpetual or not. For since all things in generation are continually changing and flowing, how can the allotments of the providential rulers of them be said to be perpetual? 
   For things in generation are not perpetual. But if their allotments are not perpetual, how is it possible to suppose that divine government can subsist differently at different times? 
   For an allotment is neither a certain separate energy of the Gods, so that sublunary natures changing, we might say that it is exempt and remains immutable, nor is it that which is governed alone, so that no absurdity would follow from admitting that an allotment is in a flowing condition, and is conversant with all-various mutations; but it is a providential inspection, and unrestrained government of divinity over sublunary concerns. 
   Such being the doubts with which this subject is attended, the following appears to be the only solution of the difficulty.

   We must say then, that it is not proper to consider all the natures that are in generation and generation itself, as alone consisting of things mutable and flowing, but that there is also something immutable in these, and which is naturally adapted to remain perpetually the same. 
   For the interval which receives and comprehends in itself all the parts of the world, and which has an arrangement through all bodies, is immoveable, lest being moved it should require another place, and thus should proceed from one receptacle to another ad infinitum. 
   The etherial vehicles also of divine souls with which they are circularly invested, and which imitate the lives in the heavens, have a perpetual essence, and are eternally suspended from these divine souls themselves, being full of prolific powers, and performing a circular motion, according to a certain secondary revolution of the celestial orbs. 
   And in the third place the wholeness of the elements has a permanent subsistence, though the parts are all-variously corrupted. For it is necessary that every form in the universe should be never failing, in order that the universe may be perfect, and that being generated from an immoveable cause, it may be immoveable in its essence. But every wholeness is a form; or rather it is that which it is said to be through the participation of one all-perfect form.

   And here we may see the orderly progression of the nature of bodies. For the interval of the universe is immoveable according to every kind of motion. But the vehicles of divine souls alone receive a mutation according to place; for such a motion as this, is most remote from essential mutation. And the wholeness of the elements admits in its parts the other motions of bodies, but the whole remains perfectly immutable. 
   The celestial allotments also which proximately divide the interval of the universe, co-distribute likewise the heavens themselves. But those in the sublunary region, are primarily indeed allotted the parts which are in the interval of the universe, but afterwards they make a distribution according to the definite vehicles of souls. 
   And in the third place, they remain perpetually the same according to the total parts of generation. The allotments of the Gods therefore do not change, nor do they subsist differently at different times; for they have not their subsistence proximately in that which may be changed.

   How therefore do the illuminations of the Gods accede to these? How are the dissolutions of sacred rites effected? And how is the same place at different times under the influence of different spirits? 
   May it not be said, that since the Gods have perpetual allotments, and divide the earth according to divine numbers, similarly to the sections of the heavens, the parts of the earth also are illuminated, so far as they participate of aptitude. 
   But the circulation of the heavenly bodies, through the figures which they possess produce this aptitude; divine illumination at the same time imparting a power more excellent than the nature which is present to these parts of the earth. 
   This aptitude is also effected by nature herself as a whole inserting divine impressions in each of the illuminated parts, through which they spontaneously participate of the Gods. 
   For as these parts depend on the Gods, nature inserts in such of them, as are different, different images of the divinities. 
   Times too co-operate in producing this aptitude, according to which other things also are governed; the proper temperature of the air; and in short, every thing by which we are surrounded contributes to the increase and diminution of this aptitude. 
   When therefore conformably to a concurrence of these many causes, an aptitude to the participation of the Gods is ingenerated in some one of the natures which are disposed to be changed, then a certain divinity is unfolded into light, which prior to this was concealed through the inaptitude of the recipients; possessing indeed his appropriate allotment eternally, and always extending the participation of himself, similarly to illuminations from the sun, but not being always participated by sublunary natures, in consequence of their inaptitude to such participation. 
   For as with respect to partial souls such as ours, which at different times embrace different lives, some of them indeed, choose lives accommodated to their appropriate Gods, but others foreign lives, through oblivion of the divinities to whom they belong; thus also with respect to sacred places, some are adapted to the power which there receives its allotment, but others are suspended from a different order. And on this account, as the Athenian guest in Plato says, some places are more fortunate, but others more unfortunate.

   The divine Iamblichus however, doubts how the Gods are said to be allotted certain places according to definite times, as by Plato in the Timaeus, Minerva is said to have been first allotted the guardianship of Athens, and afterwards of Sais. 
   For if their allotment commenced from a certain time, it will also at a certain time cease. For every thing which is measured by time is of this kind. And farther still was the place which at a certain time they are allotted, without a presiding deity prior to this allotment, or was it under the government of other Gods? 
   For if it was without a presiding deity, how is it to be admitted that a certain part of the universe was once entirely destitute of divinity? 
   How can any place remain without the guardianship of superior beings? 
   And, if any place is sufficient to the preservation of itself, how does it afterwards become the allotment of some one of the Gods? 
   But if it should be said that it is afterwards under the government of another God, of whom it becomes this allotment, this also is absurd. For the second God does not divulse the government and allotment of the former, nor do the Gods alternately occupy the places of each other, nor daemons change their allotments. 
   Such being the doubts on this subject, he solves them by saying that the allotments of the Gods remain perpetually unchanged, but that the participants of them, at one time indeed enjoy the beneficent influence of the presiding powers, but at another are deprived of it. He adds that these are the mutations measured by time, which sacred institutes frequently call the birth-day of the Gods.
 

The Theology of Plato Proclus 
Excepts from Book VII, chapters I and II 
Translated by Thomas Taylor 
isbn 1 898910 07 3