From the Author
This collection of essays grew of itself from the initial wish to mark the 500th anniversary of Ficino’s death (especially as the 500th anniversary of his birth went unmarked in 1933, since when, thanks to Professor Kristeller’s pioneering work,Ficino’s name is now widely known as the very centre of the Florentine Renaissance). When the material on this much-loved man was finally collected together, the extraordinary amount and range of his writings and influence was revealed, and I am delighted to have brought together such a fund of information and inspiration concerning a man whose relevance to the 21st century and the third millennium is thus apparent — as reviewers have remarked.
About the Author
Michael Shepherd is a former art critic of the Sunday Telegraph and has worked on the acclaimed translations of The Letters of Marsilio Ficino
Excerpt. © Reprinted by permission. All rights reserved.
“It is not for small things but for great that God created men, who, knowing the great, are not satisfied with small things. Indeed, it is for the limitless alone that He created men, who are the only beings on earth to have re-discovered their infinite nature and who are not fully satisfied by anything limited however great that thing may be.” (Marsilio Ficino, Letters, Vol 4, letter 6).
This passage, tucked away in a letter to one of his friends, offers the perfect introduction to Marsilio Ficino for those unfamiliar with his writings. It indicates why the 500th anniversary of his lifetime should be cause for celebration; and reason for his rediscovery as one of the great and timeless ‘friends of mankind’.
For he is one of those rare beings who seem to be born with the welfare of the whole human race as their prime concern; and he expresses this with love, authority, scholarship, poetic imagination and sublime eloquence….
It was writings such as this, from his villa at Careggi overlooking Florence — and personal contact too, for Ficino delivered sermons as a priest, gave lectures, supervised an academy, wrote letters and is said to have been loved by young and old in his day for his conversation — which helped to awaken those surging energies,in many fields of human interest and discovery, which we so marvel at and call the Renaissance….
His influence can be traced — in England and in the idealistic New World as much as anywhere — through the succeeding centuries, as theologian and philosopher (though himself believing these two terms ultimately to be one), and poetic voice of transcendent love, human and divine; inspiring poets and artists with a new, many-layered language of imagination; and providing the new sciences with psychology — literally, the knowledge of the soul…
For those who wish to discover the golden thread of our Western tradition — which ultimately must be the tradition of truth itself — Ficino is an excellent point of entry…
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