Select works of Porphyry

Select works of Porphyry contains his four books on abstinence from animal food, his treatise on the Homeric cave of the nymphs, and his auxiliaries to the perception of intelligible natures. The volume is translated from the Greek by Thomas Taylor, with an appendix explaining the allegory of the wanderings of Ulysses, by the translator. An interpretation of the allegory says Ulysses, who has not yet taken leave of a life according to sense, is driven by the warmth of passion, represented by the southern gales.

The text asks whether all the passions of the soul in brutes are not similar to ours, saying it is not the province of man alone to apprehend juices by the taste, colours by the sight, odours by the smell, sounds by the hearing. The text says that brutes are not deprived of sense because they are not men. The text says it is not now surveying the congress of bodies, but of things which are entirely distinct from each other.