158 GIORDANO BRUNO PART 



it does not act upon matter from without, but from 

 within, 1 the efficient cause is at the same time an 

 inward principle. 



Formal The formal cause of nature is the ideal reason ; 



nature! before the intelligence can produce species or particular 

 things, can bring them forth from the potentiality of 

 matter into reality, it must contain them "formally," i.e. 

 ideally, in itself, as the sculptor cannot mould different 

 statues without having first thought out their different 

 forms. 2 This ideal reason is the Idea ante rem of the 

 Scholastics. The ideas of the intelligence are not, 

 as such, the things of nature, they are the models by 

 which the intellect guides nature in its production of 

 individual things. The final cause which the intellect 



Final cause, sets before itself is the perfection of the universe, i.e. 

 that all possible forms may have actual existence 

 in the different portions of matter ; from its joy in 

 this end proceeds its ceaseless activity in the production 

 of forms out of matter. 3 



Among constitutive principles or elements of things, 



Form. the intellects again takes the foremost place as the 

 form ; for, as we have seen, it is both extrinsic and 

 intrinsic to the nature of things, . . ." the soul is 

 in the body as the pilot in the ship ; in so far as he is 

 moved along with it, he is part of the ship, but in so 

 far as he governs and guides it, he is not a part but a 

 separate agent ; so the soul of the universe, in so far 

 as it animates and gives form to things, is intrinsic 

 formal principle ; in so far as it directs and governs, 

 it is not part, nor principle, but cause." 4 As external, 

 the soul of the world is independent of matter, and 

 untouched by its defects : it is only the perfections 



1 Lag. 232. 24. 2 Lag. 232. 33 ff. 



3 On Perfection, vide infra, p. 199. 4 Lag. 233. 27. Cf. Arist. De Anima, ii. I. 



