[F] "There are four modes of knowledge which we are able to acquire in the present life:
1. The first of these results from opinion, by which we learn that a thing is, without knowing the why; and this constitutes that part of knowledge which was called by Aristotle and Plato, erudition; and which consists in moral instructions for the purpose of purifying ourselves from immoderate desires.
2. But the second is produced by the sciences, which from establishing certain principles as hypotheses, conduct to necessary conclusions whereby we arrive at the knowledge of the why, as in the mathematical sciences, but at the same time are ignorant with respect to the principles of these conclusions, because they are merely hypothetical.
3. The third species of knowledge is that which results from Plato's dialectic; in which by a progression through ideas, we arrive at the first principles of things, and at that which is no longer hypothetical, and thus dividing some things and analyzing others, by producing many things from one, and one from many.
4. But the fourth species is still more simple than this; because it no longer uses analyses or compositions, but whole things themselves by intuition, and becomes one with the object of its perception; and this energy is the Divine Reason, which Plato speaks of, and which far transcends other modes of knowledge."—Thomas Taylor.
[G] "Man feeds upon air, the plant collecting the materials from the atmosphere and compounding them for his food. Even life itself, as we know it, is but a process of combustion, of which decomposition is the final conclusion. Through this combustion all the constituents return back into air, a few ashes remaining to the earth from whence they came. But from these embers, slowly invisible flames arise into regions where our science has no longer any value."—Schleiden.
II.
MIND.
"But all the Gods we have are in The Mind, By whose proportions only we redeem Our thoughts from out confusion, and do find The measure of ourselves and of our powers, And that all happiness remains confined Within the kingdom of this breast of ours, Without whose bounds all that we look on lies In others' jurisdiction, others' powers, Out of the circuit of our liberties."