Editorial note — PREFACE
Edward Abbott Van Dyck translation
And the Human Soul possessing the nobility of the highest power, which is Reason, participates in the Divine Nature, after the manner of an eternal Intelligence: for the Soul is ennobled and denuded of matter by that Sovereign Power in proportion as the Divine Light of Truth shines into it, as into an Angel; and Man is therefore called by the Philosophers the Divine Animal.
A mind once formed, is never suited after; One yet in growth will ever grateful be.
[Funny Person, in Goethe’s Faust]