Spirit takes precedence over body, and the image of a body
tionably superior to every body, it follows that a spiritual nature is superior to this corporeal heaven, not because of its place but because of the excellence of its nature;'" and the same superiority is enjoyed also by that spiritual nature in which the images of bodily things are produced."®
33. In this connection there is a remarkable thing to be noted. Spirit takes precedence over body, and the image of a body comes after the real body. But, since that which is second in time is produced in that which is prior in nature, the image of a body in a spirit is more excellent than the body itself in its own substance.
It must not, of course, be thought that a body produces something in the spirit, as if the spirit were subjected as matter to the action of a body. For he who produces something is in every respect more excellent than the thing from which he produces it.
Now body is in no way more excellent than spirit; indeed, spirit is obviously superior to body. Hence, though we first see a body that we had not seen before and thereupon an image of it arises in our spirit, and in this same spirit we recall it when it is absent, nevertheless the body does not produce this image in the spirit, but the spirit produces it within itself.7? It does this with a wonderful speed that far surpasses the sluggish actions of the body. As soon as the eyes have seen their object,®° an image of it is formed without a moment's delay in the spirit of the one who sees.
And it is the same in the case of hearing. Unless the spirit immediately formed within itself and retained in memory an image of the word perceived by the ears, one could not tell whether the second syllable was actually the second one, since the first would no longer exist once it had impinged upon the ear and passed away. And so all habits of speech, all sweetness of song, all motion in the acts of our body would break down and come to nought, if the spirit did not retain a memory of past bodily motions with which to join further operations. And the spirit surely does not retain these motions except in so far as it has formed them in imagination within itself. Furthermore, there are within us images of our future actions before the,actions themselves begin. For what act do we perform through the