6 - Looking into Our Face

Summary

This chapter discusses the first level of noetic contemplation. Both psychic and noetic level are subdivided into two levels, which could be termed contemplation “from below” and “from within” a given macrocosmic level. The first stage of noetic contemplation is looking at Intellect “from below”, that is, from the level of the World Soul and by our faculty of reason. We Intellect “as another” and in a partial way (seeing particular Forms). It is only when we ascend from that phase to noetic contemplation proper that we see, so to speak, our own face or we see the seer, which is our own intellect participating horizontally in Intellect. We also see the Forms through sensible things when we look at the world. Instead of rejecting the sensible, we embrace it, seeing the sensible things better, because now we are seeing them in and through their noetic archetypes. The whole world is within us, but the difference between the seer and the seen is overcome, and we see that we are the world.