Pico della Mirandola, Conclusiones (1486) SectionsThe thirteen condemnedScholarshipMethod

Paradoxical, new doctrines · thesis 3>39

Thesis 3>39

Latin

Dictum illud mirabile illius barbari, nympharum et demonum consortis, de .clxxxiiii. mundis in figura triangulari cum tribus unitatibus angularibus et una media constitutis, rectissime intelligetur si ab unitate intelligibili trinitatem intellectualem, animalem, et seminalem, et principalium mundi partium per primum sphericum numerum computationem, intellexerimus.

Copy-text: Farmer 1998, line 20779

English

That astonishing saying of the barbarian who kept company with nymphs and demons, about 184 worlds arranged in a triangular figure with three unities at its corners and one at its center, comes clearest into view once we grasp that the intellectual, animate, and seminal trinities issue from intelligible unity, and that the world's principal parts are computed by the first spherical number.

'that barbarian' is Plutarch's figure in the anecdote Pico adapts via Proclus's reading of Plutarch's De defectu oraculorum; 'first spherical number' = 5, per Pico's numerology; sense checked.

Translation: machine-drafted 2026-09-26 by TRANSLATOR-T06b; sense checked against farmer1998:20797; awaiting human check

Attribution: Pico's own opinion (section 3>, paradoxical conclusions introducing new doctrines) · Pico's stance: endorses