The Anatomy of the Soul

A Renaissance concept of the levels of reason

The Vegetable Soul (lowest form), possessed by plants, animals, and mankind

Functions: Reproduction, nourishment, and growth

Cf. Andrew Marvell's "To His Coy Mistress": in saying he'd be glad to wait for this woman to be ready to have a physical relationship, he says that in a perfect world "My vegetable love would grow/ Vaster than empires, and more slow." This suggests a kind of love that could exist without sensual enjoyment-and suggests, by its association with the Vegetable Soul, that it is a lower form of love than sexual love.

The Sensible Soul (middle level), possessed by animals and mankind

Divided into two main functions:

1. Desiring (passions)-lower. This level involves the "concupiscible power" (love and hate, desire and aversion, joy and grief) and the "irascible power" (anger, hope, despair, courage, fear)

2. Knowing (perception)-higher. This level incorporates both the exterior functions of the five senses (sight, hearing, touch, smell, taste) and the interior functions of the five wits (imagination, memory, common sense, estimation, fantasy). Notice that imagination and fantasy are included on this lower level of the soul, because one of the problems that sometimes comes up is that imagination can be mistaken for intuitive reason, which as you will see is an entirely different thing.

The Rational Soul (highest), possessed by mankind and by angels

Divided into two main functions:

1. Discursive reasoning--lower. Essentially empirical reasoning; it is associated with the Will and is sometimes referred to as the Intellectual or Rational Appetite. In Latin, this function is called scientia.

2. Intuitive reasoning--higher. This type of reasoning is associated with the Understanding; it is also identified with the idea of faith and wisdom, and implies an inspiration from God. In Latin, this function is called sapientia.

From Paradise Lost, V.486-88:
      ...the Soul
Reason receives, and reason is her being,
Discursive, or Intuitive

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