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The Neo-Platonists
olin
The
tine
original of
tiiis
book
is in
restrictions in
text.
http://www.archive.org/details/cu31924031006608
THE NEO-PLATOlsriSTS
LONDON
CLAY, Manager
Fetter Lane, E.G. 4
CO., Ltd.
THE NEO-PLATONISTS
A STUDY IN THE HISTORY OF
HELLENISM
BY
THOMAS WHITTAKER
SECOND EDITION
WITH A SUPPLEMENT ON THE
COMMENTARIES OF PROCLUS
CAMBEIDGE
H^
y.
sn
S.^'5\
PREFACE.
TO THE SECOND EDITION
During the time that
first
the
it
in
saw
first
had appeared
desirable.
re-
aim
volume; but
I
had
became evident
in view,
in the
end
My
it
all
minutiae on a uniform
scale.
of the lesser as well as the greater thinkers, to set forth substantially the doctrine of the school so as to bring out its
real originality
and
its historical
must
always retain an honotirable place in the history of philosophy, are of minor significance. The case
Proclus, whose
name has by
is
otherwise with
it
originality.
it
in
first.
hope that,
with the aid of these, I have been able to set before the reader
an account of
his principal
distinctive features
its
finished
initiated
by Plotinus two
centuries earlier.
vi
slight alterations.
it
appeared in 1901,
new form.
T.W.
February, 1918.
CONTENT^
FAOK
INTRODUCTION
CHAPTER
ix
GRAECO-ROMAN CIVILISATION IN
VELOPMENT
CHAPTER
II
....
CHAPTER
III
17
26
CHAPTER IV
PLOTINUS AND HIS NEAREST PREDECESSORS
CHAPTER V
THE PHILOSOPHICAL SYSTEM OF PLOTINUS
...
40
PSYCHOLOGY
43
METAPHYSICS
53
3.
70
4.
AESTHETICS
87
5.
ETHICS
91
1.
r*"2.
CHAPTER
THE MYSTICISM OF PLOTINUS
VI
CHAPTER
VII
'
....
98
107
107
2.
lAMBLICHUS
121
3.
131
CONTENTS
VlU
CHAPTER
VIII
....
PAGE
136
CHAPTER IX
THE ATHENIAN SCHOOL
1.
2.
3.
155
CHAPTER X
THE INFLUENCE OF NEO-PLATONISM
155
157
....
180
185
CHAPTER XI
CONCLUSION
206
APPENDIX
I.
II.
III.
216
218
225
SUPPLEMENT
THE COMMENTARIES OF PROCLUS
ON THE FIRST ALGIBIADES
PARMENIDMS
TIMAEUS
REPUBLIC
INDEX OF NAMES
229
242
248
264
295
gig
INTKODUCTIGN
That the
is
an impression not
in-
every effort
is
State against
Roman
external enemies.
And,
spiritually,
a new
already see in the third century the break-up of the older form
of inner as well as of outer
life.
who
And
with Stoicism,
it is
with Christianity
it
In
its
life.
struggle
It
truth.
to
make way
for the
modem, we might
companying
incipient dissolution.
which we
call
modem,
to the
critical
movement
outlook on
in
to
life,
its
INTBODUCTION
On the other
may hold that the "modernness" of the late classical
hand, we
first
system of education remained, though in a reduced form, and passed by continuous transition into another;
but the directing power was changed. The kind of " modem "
for the ancient
thus an anticipation of a
phase of transition.
much
a genuine
it
modem
all its
remoteness.
this as it
latest
ticularly
INTRODUCTION
pure philosophy. On
xi
of religion, not as
speculative thought,
all
survival as such.
its
that remained
type
and, though
human
history, it
sphere pervaded
by
of
teaching.
its distinctive
The
its
was the
it
has
never been for the modern world. There were of course those
who
disparaged
it
all
that,
ciple belonging to
INTRODirCTION
xii
movement thus
whatever superficial changes it might undergo, did not mwardly respond. Literature still looked to the past for its
models. Philosophy least of all cared to adapt itself. It became instead the centre of resistance to the predominant
movement,
^to
Caesars, to the
tradition
The kings
of thought
And
their resistance
time's decay.
resxdt of pessimism, of a
of things.
The Neo-Platonists
in particular
movement
type of
not actually predict the revival of their thought after a thousand years, they would not have been in the least stirprised to
see
it.
More than once has that thought been revived, and with
various aims nor is its interest even yet exhausted. The first
revival the philosophers themselves would have cared for was
;
became the
waXtDToms
apiiovli) k4o-/iioii
Heraclitus.
INTBODUCTION
xiii
Neo-Platonism for the principles of its resistance to the exclusive dominance of the new "mechanical philosophy." As
the humanist academies of Italy had aj<J)ealed against Scholastic
dogmatism to the
"Hobbism" went
opponents in England of
"The
made by
Of
special
An
extensive
Dr
C.
INTBODFCTION
xiv
may be
seen in Zeller
Zeller.
Whatever
world,
When
it
its
up a
was
however,
may
it
its foes.
{'
EXXyvia-fio's)
On
the wholCj
itself to
the task of
Hence a
main a history of
must be
in the
systems of
belief.
in-
^a
aim will be to show precisely at what point the way was open
an advance on previous philosophies, an advance which,
for
INTRODUCTION
it
may be
said
by
XV
ceed in making secure even for the time when the fortunes of
must be
" On pourrait
dire,
I'histoire
du platonisme."
Mattbe, Histoire
livre
VUL
Critique
oh. 28.
du
Grutsticisme,
CHAPTER
GRAECO-ROMAN CIVILISATION IN
POLITICAL DEVELOPMENT
Broadly, the
ITS
almost
who
the motive of pious intolerance. See De Bep. iii. 9, 14. After a reference to the
animal deities of Egypt as illustrating the variety of religious customs among
civiUsed men, the exposition proceeds: "Deinde Graeeiae siout apud nos,
delubra magnifica humanis oonseorata simulacris, quae Persae nefaria putaverunt, eamque unam ob causam Xerxes inflammari Atheniensium fana
iussisse dioitur,
quod
deos,
quorum domus
esset
W.
GRAECO-ROMAN CIVILISATION
["H-
can in the East. We have there before our eyes the plastic
stage which cannot in the East be reconstructed. The Greek
tragic poets quite clearly distinguished their
stitutional
own
early con-
marked
off,
archical institutions.
itself^.
Yet
this prophecy, as
we
distinguished only
^ oi!5' is
by
its
ySk TrpoTtrvovTes
dp^ovTai
'
^aO'tXeia
ykp SibXuKai
laxis.
iv 0i;Xo(tois" \i\vTai
ykp
ej
Per*. 588-594.
jSloy.
Herod,
vi. 109.
I]
Rome, which
imperial
And
justified.
were those that had come down from the time of freedom.
Declamations against tyrants were a common exercise in the
schools. And the senatorial opposition, which still cherished
ethice.1 ideal of the republic, came into power with the
emperors of the second century. What it has become the
fashion to call the "republican prejudices" of Tacitus and
Suetonius were adopted by Marcus Aurelius, who, after citing
with admiration the names of Cato and Brutus, along with
the
most of
' That the Romans themselves were conscious of this, may be seen for
example in a speech of the Emperor Claudius as recorded by Tacitus {Ann.
xi. 24) " Quid aliud exitio Lacedaemoniis et Atheniensibus f uit, quamquam
armis pollerent, nisi quod vietos pro aUenigenis arcebant? at oonditor nostri
Romulus tantum sapientia valnit, ut plerosque populos eodem die hostes,
:
12
GBAECO-ROMAN CIVILISATION
l^^-
mists,
the actual
movement of the
emperors,
it
gave a form
to a servility which, in
superstition,
less
its
who were
result,
I]
The course
been for
the Germanic tribes, the disintegrated and then nominally
revived Western Empire furnished the Church with the oppor-
internal decay
secular
life.
almost of
Teutonic monarchies, like the old Greek monarchies, were not
of the Asiatic type. They contained elements of political
aristocracy and democracy which could develop under favouring circumstances. In most cases the development did not
take place. With the cessation of feudal anarchy, the iroyal
power became too strong to be effectively checked. There was
formed under it a social hierarchy of which the most privileged
equally with the least privileged orders were excluded as such
"^j
from
all
had become,
like the
;
:
GRAECO-ROMAN CIVILISATION
[^H-
its
Byzantine form^
seemed necessary
the chapter..
':M>>
CHAPTER
II
relative importance
we may attach
human knowledge,
^ This way of putting the matter seems to reconcile the accounts of the
invention of geometry in Egypt given by Herodotus and Aristotle, which
Prof. Burnet {Early Ghreek Philosophy, 1st ed.. Introduction, p. 19) finds discrepant. Herodotus assigns the motive, viz. " the necessity of measuring the
lands afresh after the inundations"; Aristotle the condition that made it
possible, viz.
"the
leisure
THE STAGES
C*^"
origin,
a new departure in philosophy, not its first
which marks
began at Athens.
The emotion in which philosophy and science had their
common source was exactly the same in ancient Greece and
and
in renascent Europe. Plato and Aristotle, like Descartes
did
not
Hobbes, define it as "wonder." The earliest thinkers
very
imdefine it at all. Their outlook has still something
happiness
personal. With them, there is little inquiry about
and understanding.
This
is
objective content,
religion.
No
it is
traditional authority
are taken merely as offering points of contact, quite as frequently for attack as for interpretation in the sense of the
individual thinker. The handling of them in either case is
perfectly free. Results of the thought and observation of one
summed up by him, not to be straightway accepted by the next, but to be examined anew. The aim is
insight, not edification.
thinker are
still
scientific in spirit,
remarkable ways. Even the representations of the earth as a disc floating on water, and of the
latest phases of thought in
mote
in spirit
nomy
from
modem
n]
objective, as
OF GREEK PHILOSOPHY
modern
philosophical in virtue of
its
9
It
was properly
me
world or
its parts.
THE STAGES
10
t^^'
space;
Mind
as the agent
by which they
are sifted from their primitive chaos. This was the starting-
point for a
the
first
.1
science independently
tant position.
thinking
^the
and giving
it
relatively
a more impor-
One
nothing destroyed
and by
Aristotle
most
fruitful scientific-
ally
OF GREEK PHILOSOPHY
n]
The
special importance
his successors is
made by the
due to
11
its'
all
preserved
was
and weight; all "secondary" qualities being regarded as resulting from the changes of order and the interactions of the
atoms. And, on the whole, the Epicureans appealed more to
genuine curiosity about physics for
cultivating
it
itself^,
though ostensibly
human
life
of
was more
more
Mr
Lucretius in type of
mind
'
THE STAGES
12
t^^-
which
is
all States.
And
much
so
influence
on the
Roman
by Stoicism, had
jurisprudence,
is
definitely
is
Roman
civilisation.
though
On
al-
{Aristotle,
"Bonitas" is expressly distinguished from "justitia" (c. 20, 66); ct. De Off.
6, 28. In the fifth book of the De Finibus, Piso goes back for the origin of
the whole doctrine to the Platonists and Peripatetics. The following sentence
(c. 23, 65) sums up the theory: "In omni autem honesto, de quo loquimui,
iii.
tam
hominum et
nihil est
illustre
quasi
turn civibus et
gentia
iis,
OF GREEK PHILOSOPHY
ll]
13
its principles,
Scientifically,
they incorporated elements of every doctrine with the exception of Epicureanism; going back with studious interest
to the pre-Socratics, many fragments of whom the latest NeoPlatonist commentators rescued just as they were on the
lost.
On the subjective side, they carried
thought to the highest point reached in antiquity. And
point of being
Egypt
is
identified in its
* Cf. Arist.
Pol. iv.
(vii.) 9,
1329 b23:
See Appendix
I.
THE STAGES
14
C^^-
are the
same
more
The character
difficult,
or, as
Atheists, Epicureans
and
we may put
Catholics.
it
compendiously,
anticipation here
or GREEK PHILOSOPHY
II]
15
The Neo-Platonists would have carried out an ethical reform of polytheism in the spirit of the Republic and the Laws
but they did not propose to set up persecution as a sanction.
On the contrary, they were the champions of the old intellec-
And
Plato's
is
to be
pepalus
Allowance being made for the point of view, the two aspects of Plato are
appreciated with perfect exactitude by Joseph de Maistre in his vituperation
of the Greek spirit. {Du Pape, livre iv. ch. 7.) Plato's "positive and eternal
dogmas," says the brilliant reactionary, "portent si clairement le cachet
oriental que, pour le m^connaitre, il faut n'avoir jamais entrevu rAsie....Il
y avait en lui un sophiste et un th^ologien, ou, si Ton veut, un Grec et un
Chald^en. On n'entend pas ce philosophe si on ne le lit pas avec cette id^e
toujours pr^sente h I'esprit."
'
16
[CH.
II
The
Stoics in particular
had
this reputation,
which they
them
serving the
* Cf. Sueton. Nero, 52: "Liberalis disciplinas omnis fere puer attigit. Sed
a philosophia eum mater avertit, monens imperaturo contrariam esse."
^ Julian's refusal to be addressed by the title Seair&nii customary in the
East, did not conciUate the "average sensual man" of Antioch. See Miao-
pogon, 343 O 344 A SesTrbmii etvai, oi ijnjs oiSk ivixv '''oOro ixoiuy, dXXa (cai
iyavaKTeU,. .Sov\eiav 5' i/^as dyayjcdfeis Apxovai xal vd/wis. xaWoi Trbaif
:
KpsiTTOv
Tjv
dvoyA^effdai fi4v
d^ idv
ijfids
etvcu ilievBipovs;.,.
ipx^nrki d7roX<iXeKas
tiixuv
t^v
irb\ui.
CHAPTER
Irt
RELIGIOUS DEVELOPMENTS IN
LATER ANTIQUITY
Though
philosophy at
its
beginning
among
is
religion
religion.
on
To
Homer
1
W.
is
of a world of
Rohde
(Psyche,
i.)
18
of Plato's
BELIGIOUS DEVELOPMENTS
teaching had for a long time not much
t^^"
influence.
With
became
and the naturalistic schools, personal immortality
almost went out of sight. The Epicureans denied the immoral
tality of the human soul altogether, and with the Stoics survival of consciousness after death, if admitted at all, was only
till the end of a cycle or "great year." The reUgious beUef,
and especially the belief in Tartarus, became, however, in the
end vigorous enough to furnish one point of contact for a new
religion that could make it still more definite and terrible.
And one side of the new religion was prepared for by the
notion, more or less seriously encouraged, that those who
partook of the mysteries had somehow a privileged position
among the dead^. This of course was discountenanced by th6
most religious philosophers; though they came to hold that it
showed a certain want of piety towards ancestral beliefs to
influential in proportion as religion revived.
It
Aristotle
make
what may be
fested towards
it.
was maniwould b^
it
What
can be
truly said
is
Plato,
it is clear,
ligion
IN LATER ANTIQUITY
in]
19
by
many
the
The
belief of the
supreme
if
later philosophers
tions.
recognised at
all,
were subordinated to a
Aristotle
made
The
many
words.
been distributed to different powers, divine though subordinate^. And in principle the Christians could have no
objection to this. They themselves often held with regard to
angels what the pagans attributed to gods; or even allowed
the real agency of the pagan gods, but called them "daemons,"
holding them to be evil beings. The later paganism also
allowed the existence of evil daemons, and had a place for
angels among supernatural powers. Perhaps there is here a trace
of influence from the Eastern gnosis; though Proclus insisted
that the name is not peculiar to "the barbarian theosophy,"
but was applied of old to genuinely Hellenic
1
2
Cf.
divinities'.
p. 67.
ii.
255
22
20
BELIGIOTJS
DEVELOPMENTS
i^^-
is
is
are "impassible."
In oratorical
and the Resurrection, this philosophic view of the divinity had to be met. On the other hand,
the Christians made most of their converts among those who
apologies for the Crucifixion
dyy^\ovs
1
etvai
aXXo
knsii.Bhel.
ii.
23, 1400
TLXiruv
(coi
tfyqai-v.
5.
BprrivGiaiv
fiA]
66eiv.
Tert.
certum
est,
quia impossibile."
IN LATEB ANTIQUITY
21
is
by devotion to a lately born son of Zeus, persecuted and afterwards triumphant, coming from the East,
transferred to the Christus Patiens^.
many
The neglect
lines
were
of the altars
In the dialogue
a scandal to Olympus.
Momus
is
not turn out easy, since few of the gods, even among the
Hellenic ones themselves, if they come to be closely examined,
will be able to prove the purity of their race. Such an attempt
at conservative reform as is here satirised by Lucian no doubt
represented what was
still
may
got the hint for his Spaccio delta Bestia Trionfante precisely
from the dialogue of Lucian just referred to.
The nearest approach in the Hellenic world to the idea of a
1 See the notes in Paley's edition of Euripides. The Christus Patiens was
formerly attributed to Gregory Nazianzen, but is now held to be of much
later date.
[^H-
RELIGIOUS DEVELOPMENTS
22
The
of the Pythagoreans.
cities in
by
oligarchies
made themselves
intensely unpopular,
is
is
observable
succes-
Pythagoreans^ are in composition extremely eclectic, borrowing freely from the Stoics as well as from Plato and Aristotle.
Coincidences were explained
is
illustrated
According to
Zeller,
number of
in doctrine.
harmony,
Zeller,
iii.
2,
list
of them.
is
the
IN LATER ANTIQTTITY
in]
23
may have
been
first
vol.
TP.
i)
iffiiv
iiri^ov\e6oPT ToKiiv
ii.
p. 210, n.
BP. Iva
ol
di tovto Sparov
pAp^apoi Biovai.
TP.
oriii vii
Ala
Pax, 406-11.
RELIGIOUS DEVELOPMENTS
24
t''^-
theory,
the condition of untroubled intellectual activity. This
teleoof
founded by Plato in the Timaeus, was an assertion
products
are
against the notion that the stars
logical
optimism
of chance-aggregation.
As
such,
it
'
self,
Plotinus him-
human
all
that was
still
preserved in local
entirely
spirit, or, if of
to those even
it
was to be regarded
itself in
divinity.
to "theurgy,"
"
IN LATER ANTIQUITY
in]
aids,
25
powers,
what they
had at heart the continuance
had heard
of Eastern wisdom,
if
new
revela-
See Appendix
II.
CHAPTER
IV
A NAME once customarily but incorrectly applied to the Neowas "the School of Alexandria." The historians who used the name were aware that it was not strictly
correct, and now it seems to be again passing out of use. That
the Neo-Platonic teachers were not in any close association
with the scientific specialists and literary critics of the Alexandrian Museum was elaborately demonstrated by Matter in
a work which is really a History of the School or rather
Schools of Alexandria, and not, like those of Vacherot and
Platonist school
Jules
Museum.
an exaggeration. Of the obscure antipathy
which he thinks existed, he does not bring any tangible
evidence; and, in fact, when Neo-Platonism had become the
philosophy of the Graeco-Roman world, it was received at
Alexandria as elsewhere. What is to be avoided is merely the
This, however,
is
To the Jewish Platonism of Philo and to the Christian Platonism of Clement and Origen the name of "Alexandrian"
may be correctly applied for it was at Alexandria that both
types of thought were elaborated. To the Hellenic Platonism
;
of Plotinus
and
CH. IV]
27
whom by
The
From
'
'
'
'
'
''
far the
it
derived
its
unity.
'
'
aesthetic criticism he
li
ii
B
II
"
il
"
t
1^
in his
far
Yet
PLOTINUS
28
t^^-
philosophy
dissatisfied with the other Alexandrian teachers of
Ammonius.
whom he frequented, he was taken by a friend to
which Gordian was preparing against Persia (242). The Emperor was killed in Mesopotamia, and, the expedition having
with difficulty escaped to Antioch. At the age
of forty, he went to Rome (244); where, for ten whole years,
though giving philosophical instruction, he wrote nothing.
failed, Plotinus
He
Among
dismiss
all his
V. Plot. 5 : ^K
'
r. Plot. 22.
wpo(rKaip(iJv TrpopXrjfiaTOJv
AND
IV]
29
own
and takes
Plotinus had
2 xUd. 11.
F. Plot. 7.
Gallieuus tolerated Christianity. He was a
man
Ibid. 10.
'
(t>S>s
of considerable
V. Plot. 12.
V. Plot. \Z:
iiriXdixirovTOS
Tjv S'
iv Ti^ X&yeiv
ii
liriBei.
Kal
i}
irpfirris
KaWlav
Kal
^pwTijireit
PLOTINUS
30
a case
in
t^^-
answer an unedifying
set to
was committed
Porphyry, from
whom
to
',
add.
is
three, or,
more
exactly, four;
books
is
certain.
For the
rest.
definitely
state that the books are all in chronological order; but, as his
may
is
chronological,
we
it
that he carried
it
<
V. Plot. 15.
See oh. v.
AND
IV]
31
soul, as
made
those nearest him in time. His general relation to his predecessors is on the whole clear, but not the details. Of the
teachings of his Alexandrian master, nothing trustworthy is
recorded. Ammonius left nothing written, and the short
do
is
to ascribe to
positions of Plotinus, or
'
32
t^^-
PL0TINT7S
no reference to Ammonius,
it
in which there
as suspiciously
Hke what
is
related!
we
,|
time.
internal satisfaction, as
new
we
of Marcus Aurelius.
iii.
By
2, p. 452.
V. Plot. 14.
AND
IV]
33
intellect, all
Under
that remained
W.
PLOTINUS
34
t^^-
made
in spite of the
To make
clear
name
of
God
is
it
that
is
is
world" which
is its object.
is
Now Numenius
Even
TroiTjT-^y
2,
'
yap
xdfffuis /car'
this "hypostasising," as
we should
call it, of
AND
IV]
35
the
To
this accordingly
we must turn
With Philo, the Logos is the principle that mediates between the supreme God and the world formed out of matter.
Essentially the conception, in so far as it means a rational
order of production running through nature, is of Greek origin,
being taken directly from the Stoics, who got at least the
suggestion of it from Heraclitus^. Philo regards the Logos
as containing the Ideas in accordance with which the visible
world was formed. By this Platonising turn, it becomes in
the end a different conception from the divine "Reason" of
the Stoics, embodied as that is in the material element of
On
in the
many
fire.
as
principle of things
intellect
which
is its
is
distinguished
proximate
mind
is
effect;
and,
regarded as
hand, Plotinus
1 iii. 2,
'
differs
p. 219, n. 3.
Drummond's
i.
F. Pht. 18. The position which he had adopted from Longinus was
l^a ToS vav i^(iTi\Ke ra, vatfri.,
32
Hn
t^^-
PLOTINIJS
36
by combining
Stoical
is
concerned, the
we
there learn,
is
Good
in the
sweeping. It
AND
IV]
37
substantially to anticipate.
He
had rather tended by their eclecticism to conThat the conception was in Plato, the Neo-Platonists
not only admitted but strongly maintained. Yet Plato's metaphorical expressions had misled even Aristotle, who seriously
thought that he found presupposed in them a spatial extensio n
of the soup. And if Aristotle had got rid of semi-materialistic
"animism" even in expression, this had not prevented his
successors from running into a new materialism of their own.
Much as the Platonising schools had all along protested
against the tendency to make the soul a kind of body or an
outcome of body, they had not hitherto overcome it by clear
definitions and distinctions. This is one thing that Plotinus
and his successors achieved in their effort after an idealist
his precursors
fuse.
metaphysic.
It
was on
' Jules Simon, in his Histoire de I'^cole d'Alexandrie, dwells on this point
as an argument against the view, either that Neo-Flatonism borrowed its
Trinity from Christianity or Christianity from Neo-Platonism.
^
279.
by
Aristotle.
is not open
See Gomm. in Tim. 226 d; ed. Diehl,
38
t^^-
PLOTINITS
it
received none at
all.
At most an
isolated ex-
of the Platonism in the Fourth Gospel. Numenius, it is interesting to note, was one of the few earlier writers who attach
wanting
comes
While the Neo-Platonists are more conthan the Stoics, there is nothing harsh or
repulsive in their asceticism. The ascetic life was for them
not a mode of self-torture, but the means to a happiness
which on the whole they succeeded in attaining. Perhaps the
explanation is that they had restored the idea of theoretic
has disappeared.
sistently ascetic
'
AttikIj^w; (M.
au Judalame,
p. 175, n. 2, disputes
Suid.
fragment).
II\6.tuv
el
fi
Mwwff^s
romains rdatife
IV]
39
And
in thinking they
For theory, with
them, is the remoter source of all practice, which bears to it
the relation of the outward effect to the inward cause.
as a source of
knew that
feel.
CHAPTER V
THE PHILOSOPHICAL SYSTEM OF PLOTINUS
A.S
idealists
and
by
is
language. This
Plotinus,
fuses to call external things real in the full sense, because they
The reality is the fixed mental concept or its unchanging intelligible object. Modem idealism regards things
as merely "phenomenal," because they appear to a consciousness, and beyond this appearance have no definable reality.
are in flux.
all
thinking subjects.
typically ancient
it
both.
OH. V]
same
how
41
difficulty.
..^
may
To
those
who named
any manner
fixed,
Arist.
De An.
iii.
4,
o.)
[CH.'I
42
9f material existence. For Plotinus, this subordinate opposition has become the starting-point. He does not dismiss the
earlier antithesis but the main problem with him is not to find
permanence somewhere as against absolute flux. He allows in
the things of sense also a kind of permanence. His aim is first
;
of
all
its
own,
common
as
of
to the
be known by
essentially materialism,
made by the
sceptical attack
less
sure of
itself,
to
bodies.
'
OF PLOTINTJS
V]
43
whereas the
admitted of no expla-
called in modern phrase a "rational psyHis psychology, however, is the centre. Within
the soul, he finds all the metaphysical principles in some way
chology."
represented. In
intellect, of
it
moving and
some
sense,
by what may be called his "emhe prepared the starting-point for the
distinctively modern "theory of knowledge." This he did, as
Prof. Siebeck has shown ^, by the new precision he gave to the
conception of consciousness. On this side he reaches forward
to Descartes, as on the other side he looks back to Plato and
of matter
itself.
Further,
pirical psychology,"
Aristotle,
1.
Psychology.
It is absurd, or rather impossible, says Plotinus at the opening of one of his earliest expositions'', that life should be the
is
either
"breath," or
it is
is really,
In the latter
is
i.
2.
'
Enn.
iv. 7.
::-ff^^\.
44
[CH|
either be
the organism.
accumulated an
(to
and not
itself,
it
becomes affected in
3!
its
is
and so
turn.
in
also
That
supposed' of
The
own mode
of statement,
Thus
in
it is
'
Enn.
rr. 2, 1.
'
'
OF PLOTINUS
V]
of a body, which
45
is
is
1 Cf. Enn. VI. 4, 1. The peculiar relation of the soul, in itself indivisible, to
the body, in itself divisible, and so oommunioating a kind of divisibiUty to the
soul, Plotinus finds indicated by the divine enigma " of the " mixture in the
Timaeus. Enn. IV. 2, 2 toSto apa iirrl rb Setus ^nyii.ivoy t^s d,fi.epi<rrov kuI
id Kari, to aira ^oiJffTjs [oiirios] Kal ttjs ircpl ri a-ii/mTa yiyvofiiivtjs fiepiaTrjs
rplrov i( d/iupoTv aweKepiaaTo oiirtas etSos.'
' Enn. I. 1, 4: J^ttjWoc Si Kal rbp rpivov rrii /il^eus, /iiJiroTe oi Swarbs ,
wawep &v el rts X^oi /u/jjixSm Xeu/cy ypafiii'/jv, tpiaiv fiXXiji' oXXjj. This book,
though coming first in Porphyry's arrangement according to subjects, is given
'
'
'
'
'
46
[CH.
sense
is
brain
to this region.
its
is
the
Enn.
rv. 3, 23.
Were
a
if
this the
Enn.
iv. 6.
whole
process,
OF PLOTINFS
v]
we should
47
(fir]
The impression
it is
is
an
articu-
{trddr}) are
and judgments of them are another. Memory of things is produced by exercise of the soul, either generally or in relation
to a special class of them. Children remember better because
they have fewer things to attend to. Mere multitude of
impressions retained, if memory were simply an affair of
retaining impressions, would not cause them to be less remembered. Nor should we need to. consider in order to remind ourselves nor forget things and afterwards recall them
to mind. The persistence of passive impressions in the soul,
if real, would be a mark rather of weakness than of strength,
for that which is most fixedly impressed is so by giving way
{to yap ivTvirmrarov t(u eiKeiv ea-rl toiovtov). But where
there is really weakness, as in the old, both memory and per;
The
activity of perception,
though
itself
what goes on
in the composite
Memory itself!
it
Enn.
IV. 3,
26:
TrpotrTiBe/xii'iiii'
tivuv
"K^Bt),
iv
S'
48
[CH.
weU
the
life
perfection of virtue
indefinitely their
The
as
another question.
is
concludes,
is
air
Bim.
IV. 3, 27.
'
Enn.
iv. 5.
OF PLOTINUS
V]
49
diminution of
Enn.
IV. 5,
Enn. n.
Enn. n.
8.
8, 1
in
Cf.
Theory of Vision,
79.
Scupovfiivov,
Cf Thecyry of Vision,
.
W.
56.
50
[CH.
is
have
their origin
is their
source
is
shown by the
differences, in
and between
bodily movements'.
The
difference
between the
affection of
the animated body on the one side and the soul's clear perception of
it
irascible emotion*.
Of
is
to
first, but both spring from a common root. That its origin
cannot be entirely independent is shown by the fact that those
the
who are less eager after bodily pleasures are less prone to anger
and irrational passions. To explain the impulse {op fir/) to repel
actively the cause of injury, we must suppose perception added
to the mere resentment (oLyavaKTrjcrK), which, as a passion,
Enn. n.
8, 1
Hvi
yi,p rpwrios rb hi
r^ ipav^
wairep doxei tj
is
on
4^ ri
opfitfJLevov
'
Enn.
Enn.
t4 irdOos
rv. 4,
18-21.
ri
ii
Enn.
rv. 4, 28.
irpiSirov
iraOduTos SiSitrKorm
OF PLOTINTJS
v]
which
this kind of
t-Xyoi})
has
its
51
may
"unmixed"; but
it
has to manifest
itself
under conditions
of time and in relation to the composite being. Further discussion of these points will in the
is
distinctively
is
had
it is
(as it
1
8
Enn.
Enn.
IV. 4, 17.
IV. 3,
Enn.
iv. 3, 25.
28-30.
42
52
[CH-
Here we come to the psychological conception of " consciousness," which Prof. Siebeck has traced through its formative
stages to its practically adequate expression by Plotinus^ By
Plato and Aristotle, as he points out, such expressions are used
as the "seeing of sight," and, at a higher degree of generality,
the "perceiving of perception" and the "thinking of thought";
but they have no perfectly general term for the consciousness
with which we follow any mental process whatever, as distinguished from the process itself. Approximations to such terms
were made in the post-Aristotelian period by the Stoics and
others, but it was Plotinus who first gained complete mastery
of the idea. Sometimes he speaks of "common perception"
(i7vvaLa67iav<s) in a generalised sense. His most usual expression is that of an "accompaniment" {trapaKoKovdrf(TL<i) of its
own mental activities by the soul. " Self-consciousness," in its
distinctive meaning, is expressed by "accompanying oneself"
{irapaKoKovdelv eavTw). With these terms are joined expressions for mental "synthesis" {avvdetn,<! and avveaK) as a
unitary activity of the soul in reference to
its
contents.
of subjective
life,
'
Enn.
I.
4, 10.
i.
2, pp.
Enn.
331
iv. 4, 2.
ft.
OF PLOTINFS
V]
53
of thought.
we know an
is
Metaphysics.
its
In
soul,
however,
we
Enn.
V. 8, 11: oiSi
6tpSa\iJ.oTs Toi!
yip
is
6ds
iaiiroi'
ws alaBifrhv okto
54
[CH.
ing itself and not the world, but containing as identical with
its own nature the eternal ideas of all the forms, general and
explicit in the things of time and
has
still a certain duality, because,
space. Even
and
the
inteUigible are the same, that
intelligence
though
which thinks distinguishes itself from the object of thought.
particular, that
become
intellect
distinguishable in apprehension,
is
that
is
This
itself.
is
identical with
the absolute
is
is
uiiity
other than
all
all things
able is the greatest good and neither the goodness and unity
they possess, nor their aspiration after a higher degree of it,
can be explained without positing the absolute One and the
;
Good
absolute
By
as their source
and end.
is
/in
('
of things
is
derived from
it,
^though not to be had without due preparation belongs to the mystical side of the
doctrine. Of the philosophical doctrine itself, the method is
not mystical. The theory of "emanation" on which it de-
This
last,
being incommunicable
pends
is
in reality
of the principle
all
and so
forth,
reached.
till
He
by
its
this representation,
Enn.
V. 2, 1.
HBeaSai Kal
OF PLOTINUS
V]
however,
is
There
55
is
no diremption of
disperse themselves
is
more or
less in-
the
Mind; and
this looking
back
is
of
to
generation.
whom, he says, the Demiurgus is Intellect, which is produced by the Good beyond mind and being, and in its turn
for
1
"
irepl
Enn.
Enn.
V. 2, 2.
V. 1, 6: Trepl\aii\l/iv i^ airoS fUv, i^ airov Si /ihovTos, otov i[Klov rb
ad
yevvibinaiov fi^vovTos.
[Ch4
56
assertion that
it
thinks
itself.
to Mind,
pates in
Enn.
V. 1, 8:
Enn.
Enn.
V. 1, 9.
'
vo/iil^eii'
*
6
fifiiv
Enn.
without spatial
interval'.
rmra
tj
ipiaei t/itt4
Tavra ian
rb.
elprmiva,
vov
oStmxM
elvai.
Enn. v. 5, 9.
t^ Siavolq. ri \ey6neyoy
XafiPaviru.
'
is itself
V. 1, 10: uo-Trep di iv
Koi Tap'
Enn.
Enn.
Enn.
iStrTc
VI. 4, 13.
OF PLOTINUS
V]
This
57
is
As
world.
is
already
life.
causes^.
The primal One from which all things are is everywhere and
nowhere. As being the cause of all things, it is everywhere.
As being other than all things, it is nowhere. If it were only
"everywhere," and not also "nowhere,"
it
would
be all things'.
is
it but of ourselves,
remains in itself*. This
it
while
it
is
is
greatest of
all,
by potency;
Enn.
in
'
fj
Enn.
Enn.
Enn.
m.
'
6, 4.
Enn. ra.
9, 3.
VI. 9, 3.
VI. 9,
Swifi^as.
fj
toS iJ,eyi8ovs
[CH.
58
imparts good
is
it
because
all
and
Yet
itself."
it
one with being. As it is the Good above all goods, so, though
without shape or form, it possesses beauty above beauty. The
love of it is infinite; and the power or vision by which mind
thinks
it is
Any
intellectual love".
might appear to be in making asabout the One is avoided by the position that nothing
not even that it "is" any more than that it is "good" is
to be affirmed of it as a predicate. The names applied to it
are meant only to indicate its unique reality*. The question
is then raised, whether this reality is best indicated by names
infionsistency there
sertions
know whether an
we
can
^fiiv)
deoii'!
Kol
en fiaXKov
iirl Oeov),
(/SouXiyo-t?),
and place
Xoya
we may
6p0^),
conclusion that an unimpeded theoretic activity such as we
ascribe in its perfection to the gods
who
live according to
mind,
is
with the remark that that only is enslaved which, being withheld by something else, has it not in its power to go towards
the good. The view that seems implied in the objection,
TO,
nn.
VI. 7,
32
"
Enn.
Enn.
Enn.
on
VI. 7, 35.
tQv Svtuv
icai
vdvra
"
oiSii' ptiv,
^f airov.
VI. 7, 38.
VI. 8, 4.
is voCs iptSv.
Enn.
Enn.
vi. 8, 1.
vi. 8, 7.
&n
Sarepn
OF PLOTINUS
V]
59
master of what it is, but is what it is, not from itself; and so,
that it has no freedom, since its doing or not doing what it
has been necessitated to do or not to do, is not in its own
power. To this the reply is, that we cannot say that the
primal cause is by chance, or that it is not master of its
itself
belongs
and
its
essence
may
to be
what
it is,
It wills
even
itself,
it is,
when
it
so far only as
par-
it
has
speech, accordingly,
it
name
of unreason,
we
must
it is
"what
it
thus because
best
is
Enn.
VI. 8, 7
is
airov
*
rixv
^'' ^^^yo/./iev,
oihe oi xipiov
rijf
y^yove.
c.
thus. It
'
Enn.
iariv, dXX'
vi. 8, 12.
Swep iiPovMiBri
airrbs.
Cf.
60
[CH.
itself,
without
life,
perfect
and the
essence
is
objects not,
Enn.
Enn.
Ibid.
Enn.
Enn.
>
VI. 8, 10.
VI. 8,
:
ri)
VI. 8, 16.
VI. 8,
21
kuI
yip tA tA
Enn.
vi. 8, 18.
Since
it is
ivevipyjiTov.
Cf.
Enn.
That
V. 6, 6:
S\m
Enn.
Enn.
Enn.
I.
7, 1)
to be
this
V. 4,.l.
V. 4, 2.
irpiyiian.
"
V. 5, 1.
Cf.
Enn.
v. 9, 5:
S,vev CXt/s
iTurr'^p.ri
raMv
t<?
OF PLOTINUS
V]
supramundane
unity
it
of
that was or
all
is
causes.
or
61
Within
its indivisible
is
to be existent in
its
positions of a science to
of them.
By
this
it
There are as
many
ri de
Kal
Koffiirjaai.
dXXaxoC ^XfOK * tA Si
iv ivl
^X" ''^
'^'"^ fii,e/iepu7n4tioi>,
iWaxoS avdpwirov
w&vra.
el
xal
eidr).
62
[CH.
and
^are individuals,
all
manifest to light.
all things,
all
so that
the splendour
is infinite.
In the intelligible world identical with intellect, as thus conand space in which the visible world appears,
too,
perception and
its
must be
so,
'
ivo
Enn. V. 8, 4.
Enn. VI. 7, 3:
"
Enn.
v. 8, 6. This is quite
ii>
OF PLOTINUS
V]
63
intelligible world.
lawsK Nor
We call it so
the thing
is
when
it is
with-
division
is
wrappings*.
The whole
intelligible
is
like
world
the unfolding of
may
be presented
Reason
as
it
irdvra'; irepii'X^eov).
all
(eh olov
mind has all things in the rational laws that are before reasoning*. Each thing being what it is separately, and again all
things being in one together, the complex as it were and composition of
^
Enn.
all
VI. 7,
iKei d^ Kal t6
rds
Enn.
7rot6T>)7-os,
SvvdfjLeis
iffrt,
Kal
r^v
is
i}
rfv.
&Koiovn, TT&VTa
lii'Kri
'f**^
ffd^ovaa
xv^&v
hirivTinv
^(rrtaaav de Kal
baa
6jcoal
Enn. VI. 7, 13 voOs. ..oi.. .rairbv Kal Iv n iv fiJpei, dXXd Tdvra IttcI Kal t6
lUpa av oix ^v, dXXd Kal toOto aireipov Siaipoiftevov, C. Enn. VI. 5, 5 on the
infinite nature (Aireipos ^i<ris) of being.
* Enn. VI. 7, 14:
(car e60i, dXX' els to ^tos iel.
6 Enn. VI. 7, 15^71.
' Enn. VI. 2, 21 as yip &v 6 iKpi^iaraTOS \oyiir)i.ds 'Koyta-ai.To (is dpurra, oStus
'
iv
^X
'
Enn.
ndvTtav iv ivl
oiffi.
VI. 2,
'
S'
av iv ivl ovtiov,
i]
64
\
is
mind,
[CH.
all
by position
1 in
space, but without reference to process in time. This
V characteristic of intellectual being may be called "eternity^."
there
is
Soul has
would in no way
but to order and rule the things
for thus it
after
it.
cessitated.
is
is
already ne-
as in each part of a
all,
potentially present'.
'
2
'
it is of
To
all its
Enn. V.
Sifa/uv
fii)
oiitrav
1,
("oO S
re
ivepyeli/,
dptafi^ov.
Enn.
rv. 8,
8 oi
:
ireiaa oiS'
Enn.
IV. 8,
ij
" "'^
irpoffXa^oOffa
ovTwv.
TO
/SX^oiKTO 5* irpos
/ier' airTi)v
rdvTa
iu
/iiy
rij) viyijTip,
Enn.
#x
rv. 9, 3.
is
rif
<rwfi,a
voepi etvai
Ipyov xal
els
Kttl
ofiri},
xal toD
ava
AXXo, Kad' S
trpbs
vmv.
riiv oUeiar
S&vg Tum
4px" airoO' on
/itiSi otiv
eis
re ^v ffTTJvu
N
Ttt
"dru wpbs ri
yap
When
'
Enn.
IV. 9, 5.
of
',
OF PLOTINUS
V]
65
intelligibles, is
is
their
They
selves.
many
by
spatial limits
soul
The general
is infinite^.
in each that
it
becoming conscious to
itself
is
of us
just as the
and the
all
all,
1
'
'
^ Enn. vi. 4, 4.
Enn. V. 9, 7.
Enn. VI- 4, 4 jin. : o^tas iarlv Aireipos rj roiairy) tftitris.
Enn. VI. 4, 6 Sia. tI ovv oii irwaurOdverai t) iripa ttjs iripas
:
iariv,
iXK'
oi)
irABoi.
ri
Kplfw, ;
dXV
fi
Sti xplais
l/tpiye liivov.
' Enn. VI. 5, 7 : ?f u lUv oHv opwvTes fj SBey i^-Zi/ifieBa iyvoovfuev Iv Spres, oiov
TpbaaTta iroXXa els rb (^u Kopvit>T)V ^ovTa els to etau pUav. el S^ tis ^irtarpa^ntvai
SinaiTO fi Trap' airoO tJ Trjs 'ASt/cSs ofir^s eirvx-^as t^s ?X|eus, dedv re Kal airbv
'
Enn.
icai oi
Enn.
V. 1, 2.
rd
w.
^ifa.
66
human
art,
which
is
posterior
and
extrinsic.
[CH.
of
the soul of the whole, but the soul of each, has all things in
itself^- Wherein they differ, is in energising with different
powers. Before descent and after reascent of the particular
soul,
vision,
and
choice
is
so far as that
possible.
is
Thus the
soul,
although
it
does not
it, and
from the
in a
manner becomes a
whole'.
But what
worse, and
mundane
body
is
how
is it
order?
that the
a prison, and the true aim of the soul release from it,
reconcilable with the optimism of the Timaeust The answer
is that all
descent and reascent alike has the necessity of a
is
dane order, temporary descent, dissatisfaction with the consequences of the descent, and the effort to return, are all
conditions. Any expression that seems to imply arbitrariness
at any point, is part of the mythological representation. Thus
'
Enn.
Enn.
IV. 3,
Id fin.
IV. 3, 5: X<7oi
vwv
/laWov
TJ
4Keivoi...Tb Tairhr
Enn. IV. 3, 6.
Enn. IV. 3, 18 olov dipSoK/iis ^jcairTos koI
AWi. irpiv (ItSv SX\if ISiiv eKctvos lyvu,
Enn. IV. 3, 14.
Enn. v. 1, 1.
'
Enn.
VI. 4, 16.
OF PLOTINUS
V]
when
in the
Timaeus
said that
it is
when he
is
67
God "sows"
the souls,
represented as haranguing
course
error,
own 2. And
is its
and any
evil
that
it
it
"
may do
comes under an undeviating law of justice. To the particuthem, the souls go neither by voluntary
choice nor sent, but as by some natural process for which they
are ready. The universal law imder which the individual falls
is not outside but within each'. The notion that there may be
in small things an element of contingency which is no part of
the order, is suggested but not accepted*. The whole course
of the soul through its series of bodily lives, and its release
from the body when this is attained, are alike necessarily
determined'. The death of the soul, so far as the soul can die,
which still contains a
is to sink to a stage below moral evil
mixture of the opposite good and to be wholly plunged in
matter '. Even thence it may still somehow emerge; though
souls that have descended to the world of birth need not all
it
1
'
Enn.
Enn.
IV. 8, 4.
IV. 8, 7:
Siva/us iffffeveffripa,
2 Enn. iv.
yru<m yip hiapyearipa riyaBoO
t\
iSffre iTUTT'^nxi
8, 5.
ii
17
Enn. m. 2, 4. Cf. m. 3, 4: Kal aiuKph, fiowii ipxei els (K^aaiv tov SpSov.
Enn. IV. 3, 13.
' Enn. IV. 3, 16 06 yap rd /iiv del vofili^eiv crvvTeTixSai, rd. Si Ke^aXiio'dai els
t6 aiTe^oiaiov. el yip Kar alrlas ylveffBat Set Kal (pviriKis dKoXovfflas Kal Kara
*
6
Enn.
IV. 3,
iffTirip jiiv
Enn.
I.
8,
iSirire/)
Cf.
Enn.
i<rTi
iroXXa
ipopq,
rb
IV. 4, 45.
Cf.
6, 6.
52
Enn.
68
make the
[CH.
reaching the
lowest point ^.
is
evil,
the cause
is
is
is
could be at
all.
change..
then
is
And indeed
this principle
That Matter
is
The
suppositioBi'
is
number that
is
immeasurable
{dSte^iTT/Tow^,
is
of
all
form, that
is,
extreme to things
and eviP>
'
DiK
*
of
and
is
in its
is
at the opposite;
own
nature ugly
all
intelligible,
'
Enn. n.
ij
Sw&iitui
Enn. n.
Enn. n.
ffXijs
Kai
but
it can-
4, 2.
t&v awndruv.
ij
toO
iel,
OF PLOTINUS
V]
69
One form
The reason
of this
is
in
matter
by
spatial
its
represented in
world
is
in
more real
may
being,
is
so
"matter*." Matter
itself
As the indeterminate,
it is
Enn. m. 6, 18.
Enn. n. 4, 3: ^
itSiuv
8
'
'
i]
S^ rSiv
Enn.
4^ 4.
yiro/ihw ii\ri del SXKo xal oKKo
etSos fffX",
^ Enn. m. 6, 7.
Enn. n. 4, 15.
Enn. n. 4, 10: iopurrla t^s 'I'uxn^- Cf- E'i' ! 8, 9.
Enn. m. 6, 7.
Adonais, xxxix. an exact expression of the idea of Plotinua.
tuv
Si
70
of
its
own
that
it
[CH,
it
can take no
3.
The theory
physical account,
is
new meta-
Aristotle,
Matter
is
is careful
its reality
it
phorically.
Here Plotinus
is
mentators in his
4, 11: 66 tv
Emi_
Enn.
g^
m.
6, 19.
nvh raMv
is
to be
re-
rif Kevif
tV
iiXiji'
elp^xaffi.
OF PLOTINUS
v]
71
garded as objective extension or as a subjective form*. Plotinus himself approaches the latter view when he consents to
call matter a "phantasm of mass" {<j)dvTaa-fia Be oyKav \eyco),
though still regarding it as unextended (dfiiyede^). His account
of the mental process
the ideas
known
with Plato's,
another point of Platonic interpretation, Plotinus and
his successors take the view which modern criticism seems
is
On
all
now to
find the
most
satisfactory. Plausible as
it
as teaching an origin of
Plo-
it is supposed to
have been called into being at a particular moment. That this
was all along the authorised interpretation may be seen even
from Plutarch*, who, in defending the opposite thesis, evidently feels that he is arguing against the opinion predominant among contemporary Platonists'. Thus Plotinus, when
who have
skilfully
defended
it
is
followed
by Siebeck and by
against objections.
Mr
Archer-Hind, in his
is space as a
edition of the Timaeua, takes the view that the Platonic jnatter
make
this reference,
coincidence.)
* Jlepl Ti)s iv Tiiudif \j/vxoyovlai.
' It may be noted Ihat the "Platonic matter," according to Plutarch, is
simply body or "corporeal substance." t} fjiiv oSv (rii/taTos oiala rijs Xeyo/ifrTjs
iir' airoS irooJexoBs (piaeas ISpas tc xal riSiivqs twv yevTyrHy o&x, iripa ris earai
(c.
5 fin.).
[CHp
72
he says that there never was a time when this whole was not,
nor was there ever matter unformed, is not introducing a
novelty. And on this point we do not hear that opposition
to his doctrine arose from any quarter. His difference with
Longinus was on the question whether the divine mind
eternally- contains the ideas in itself or contemplates them
eternally as objective existences; not as to whether ideas and
unordered matter once stood apart and were then brought
together
by an
The
dura-
possible,
is per-
If the
identical.
moon outwards
former view
is
the
true one, then the heavenly bodies differ from the rest only by
lasting a longer time.
no trouble
substance
if
is
we were
fifth
About the
latter
tion.
Radiant
light, as
carrying with
1
*
'
it
we have
no
Erm. n. 1, 1.
Enn. n. 1, 7: rb
G. Enn. iv. 5.
seen',
loss either of
b/ulivvixov
airQ
ipiis,
is
857
OF PLOTINTJS
V]
73
essentially differ
from
Aristotle's.
single
system, with the fixed stars and the seven planets (including
the sun and moon) revolving round the spherical earth in combinations of perfect circles. Like the stars, the earth too has
a divinity of
finite.
its
Body
is
of the whole system recur in astronomical cycles. In order to solve difficulties connected with
the infinite duration of a world in constant change, Plotinus
sometimes takes up the Stoical theory that in the recurrent
periods the sequence of events is exactly repeated. This he
itself,
how
that
"forms"
limited*.
is
offered with
Plotinus
is
no great confidence.
quite clear
is
world.
From
and number
" Enn. v. 7, 2.
tQ voryrip iTeiplav oi
As regards the soul and its \6yoi, cf c. 3.
&/iepet.
down
Se iv
'
Enn.
Sei SeSi4i>af
v. 7, 3.
iraaa yip iv
74
have an
[CH,
THE PHILOSOPHICAL SYSTEM
infinitude of their own. We may say that number is
with
it
though
infinity is
number
in intellect
To time
space.
It
is
is
the "image
is
denied to
it
Enn.
iiretpos;
VI. 6, 17:
^ t6
^ iv rif Xdyif
rijs
iireipov
we
{Kara
memory and
dis-
faculties be-
iriSs
'
OF PLOTINUS
V]
it
75
more
to the
measurement of
finally to
m.
'
Eiin.
Enn. m.
7, 7: Set
7,
aluv
ipa xal
iipuv /ierelvai
Kar AXXo if
vaaaiiila.
iifuv [6]
toO alanos.
xP^vos;
ij
iv
^ux5 tJ TotoiiTi;
jrdo-p itai
76
[CH.
What comes
modes of
matter
is
from
and mutar
away
time allowing that we ourselves are something, we must introduce the soul as another principle into the contexture of
and not only the soul of the whole, but along with
the soul of each*. Being in a contexture, and not by itself,
things,
it
it
'
Eun.
ixlvrjaei'
"
III. 1,
ij,
1:
^ 7^/3 tA ^ov\iit6v
ei firiBiv
dpeKriv
tovto
iKlvr/irev, oiS'
Sk
rj
?|w
&p oXtos
17
ela-ia
iKuiifBr).
^ t6
The
iitiBuiiitThii
principle of
not a
little
I'^cole d'Alexandrie,
each
soul,
Enn.
"
a. Enn.
III. 1, i.
III. 4,
iyepyet.
*
Enn.
III. 1, 8.
6: oi
yap
ofiolios in
toU airols
iras KiveiTat
rj
;8oiiXeToi
1;
OF
v]
77
PLOTHSTTJS
its
cause within;
and are
little
as
if
by a witch-
or nothing of them-
For
virtue
and freedom.
is
last period'.
by a
he says, if
reasoning had made it, it would have no reason to be ashamed
of its work'. This whole, with everything in it, is as it would
be if providentially ordered by the rational choice of the
human
come
to be
art, yet,
Maker 'If,
ago,
come into
which regulates
'
Enn.
Enn.
Enn.
m.
m.
2,
m.
2, 3:
VI. 8, 17.
3,
i.
8.
oiS' el 'Koyur/jJii
eiti
78
[CH.
it
manner possible. Since, however, the world is without beginning and end, the providence that governs the whole consists
in its being in accordance with mind,
time but as
its
which
is
before
it
not
in
which
is
virtue
it
may
who
^is
still
dis-
tribution of
And
Enn.
m.
2, 8.
OP PLOTINUS
V]
79
they themselves are worse in relation to the parbe undergone. If they are content
to be fatted sheep, they should not complain of becoming a
prey to the wolves. And, Plotinus adds parenthetically, the
spoilers too pay the penalty first in being wolves and wretched
in so far as
it
Thus
in a
drama
all
e)(pvTi).
And
reason does not take the souls from outside itself and fit them
into the poem by constraining a portion of them from their
own nature
reason
itself,
and
it fits
[CH
80
men?
in
all.
The ordered battles
dancing the Pyrrhic dance, show that what
that death
is
mankind
nothing
life.
terrible^.
men fight as if
we take for the
man
But how
and
declare
for the reason which is the creative word of the drama fixes
the place both of pardon and of its opposite; and it does not
assign to
2, 15: utnrep 8k ^irl r(av Bedrpuv rats ffKriPotSj oVrta XP^ '^'^^ '^'^^
BeaaSai xal irdxTOS Bavdrovs Kal irSXeav aXdffas Kal ipwayis, /leTaBiaeu
irAvra koI
'
'
Kid
ol/iwyQv iiroKpiireis.
it/ti
/xijS^
ffvyyvdfiovas
rrjs avyyvii/iiis
rots roioiiroir
OP PLOTINUS
V]
81
that good
Still,
of
existence.
its
actual,
case,
even
deepest ground
evil,
if
while
it is
good comes of
manifest
and
evil in us,
coming as
it
If it is
is
is that
not in so far as the forms are pure that they are the source
of ignorance and bad desires, but in so far a,s they are mixed,
with matter (\6yoi, evv\oi). The fall of the soul is its approach
it is
to matter,
and
it is
its
peded by the presence of matter, which does not allow all its
powers to arrive at their realisation'. Yet without this principle of indeterminateness that vitiates the pure formSj
causing them to miss their true boundary by excess or defect,
there would be for us neither good nor any object of desire.
There would be neither striving after one thing nor turning
away from another nor yet thought. "For our striving is
after good and our turning away is from evil, and thought
with a purpose is of good and evil, and this is a good*."
The
1
m,
dvSp&p
Enn.
irovTipwv.
el
From a passage
oWoi
like this
<fi(itnv
iwb
Plotinua was
'
dpa
*
Enn. I. 8, 7.
Enn. 1. 8, 14:
ii\ri
^"xv
oWo.
irp&rtpav
Enn.
<t>p6y'iiais
W.
de
v/njcris
Kal
ri
82
dox
With
Christianity.
[cfi.
orthoi-
both because
because
it
it is
in
some ways
is
in it
begins
by asking them
series
by the Platonising
Gnostics", Plotinus
to assign the cause of the " fall " (a-tjjdX-
world,
it
attached to
there are
it
many
it
Enn. n.
'
a. Enn. n.
ill,
heavenly bodies of
all
participation in the
Tlpis roiis KO/t6 riv Sriniovpyw toO kIkthov koX tov kSithov
etvai Xiyoi/Tas, or llpis tovs yvuaTiKois.
9.
9,
6: ras Se
Enn. u. 9, 4: H yi,p
yap rb Xva n/MifTo,
yeXolav
&Was
iroirTdcreis
xpv \iyfir ds
mm
eUriyovai;
xal fieravolas
ft;/
yevi<r0ai, (k
tov
Ko<r/ioroirjir(u;
ivraSSa.
OF PLOTINUS
V]
intelligible,
make
is
this earth,
they
made
Much
Not honouring
Whence
83
especially
in terrestrial things?
they
soul,
Enn. n. 9, 5
Enn. n. 9, 6
:
iriSs
iirel
rd ye
pti)
^'^
''
is
fettered
OToix^liav
lyiaTam
i^avarap^oii
by
Ap,eliiia
ivSptirovs
62
84
'
[CH.
it.
who put
it
is
for ever; in
ment there?
In the distribution of riches and poverty and such
man
the
things*
for
life
real advantage.
Is there
done and
out
vic-
it.
Yet
You
and above
its
have their place with God, and not dream that after God
they themselves are alone in their goodness, and that other
men and the whole visible world are without all part in the
divine. It is easy, however, to persuade unintelligent men
also
Enn. n.
9,
ci Si
OP PLOTINTTS
V]
85
who have no
are good
universe because
were to
call
all is
artist,
We
it is
it is
not per-
not reason.
is
if
higher
still
by the
ofct ot6v
of
yap
'
o. 9,
T ercoi dcSpi
Enn. n.
a comparison
is
a^bv Tavra
9, 12: (pvauvlrrepov
TTJs (piffeus
Enn. n.
iiA\
sects is
fii]
yap
iy,
426
XeybvTUv
tt&vtujs, dXX'
oix
lis oi
i?
ivSelais
86
[CH.
touched upon. This way of thinking, the philosopher pro*ceeds, with its positive blame of providence going beyonrf|
even the Epicurean denial, and dishonouring all the laws of
our mundane life, takes away temperance, and the justice
implanted in moral habits and perfected by reason and prao
tice,
and
in general all
who have no
be
set in
is
end and fixed in the soul with moral wisdom that points
God. Without true virtue, God is but a name*.
How,
to
beauty.
'
any resemblance to
intelligible
What man
is
there
is
is in sensible sounds?
Or who is there that is skilled in
geometry and numbers and does not take pleasure in seeing
the orderly and proportionate with his eyes? And is there
any one who, perceiving all the sensible beauty of the world,
has no feeling of anything beyond it? Then he did not
apprehend sensible things with his mind. Nothing can be
really fair outside and foul within. Those who are called
beautiful and internally are ugly, either have a false exterior
beauty also, or their ugliness is adventitious, their nature
Enn. n.
9,
ovo/jui
icnv.
OF PLOTINFS
V]
87
Aesthetics.
4.
among
this clear.
'
Philo also,
it
mind
popular astrology the notion that the planets exercise mahgnaut influences.
Plotinus has some ironical remarks on the terror they express of the immense
and fiery bodies of the spheres. Against the astrological polytheism which
regarded the planetary gods as rulers of the world, he himself protests in a
book where he examines sceptically and with destructive effect the claims of
astrdogy. See Snn. n. 3, 6 1 SXws 5i /itiSevi ivl rb Kipiov t^s SioLK-fiaea$ SMvai,
TtliToti Si Til irivTB.
SMvai, waircp
TttyfUvov o5
Kal alriav
^
Enn.
/ier'
TrpiiT'rjv iirl
I.
6.
oiiK
irAvra lov(rav.
^ovtos
88
[CH.
become
fire is
it is
in the soul.
What
then
is it
that those
who
love beauty of
others or in
ness
we
All virtue
is beautiful.
is
purification.
Now
the soul, as
it
Enn.
I.
6, 1
ofre yi/i
uis
Here the
theoretical explanation is to be
OF PLOTINTTS
V]
evil.
as
89
it is
Soul
is
made
of
it.
Enn.
I.
No
6, 8.
M ^iveiv, dXV
oTov liiaavra.
M iTn^dWeiv tJ
yeyev-n/j.iyos, oiSi
'
rb
Love of the
Enn.
1.
B4(f.
rb Ka\bi>
6, 9: wo-re
/J^v vorrrov
oi
yhp
ftv
6\j/i.v
Tdnrore eUev
KoM]
6ijj$a\fi.bs
rfKiov ^XioeiS^s
yevofiipii.
90
because
it is
[CH.
at once a
piration after
is
beauty, which
may
still
statue comes not from the matter of the unshapen stone, but
the arts do not simply imitate the thing seen, but run back to
the rational laws whence its nature is. Besides, they create
up
The
arts themselves
Enn.
V. 5, 12: xai iari Sk ri /iiv ^ttiok xal Tpoffrivis Kal &ppiTffiov koL,
t6 8f ffA/i^os
^x"
lis
ijdov^v.
Enn.
Enn.
VI. 7, 22.
V. 8.
Enn.
vi. 6, 1.
OF PiiOTINUS
V]
91
weakened resemblances of the mental concepThus we are brought back to the thought
that if we would recognise true beauty, whether seen in nature
or in art, we must look within \ The proper abode of beauty
is the intellectual being to which the soul attains only by
inward vision. Above it is the good beyond knowledge, from
which it is infused. Below it is the beauty found, dispersed
in visible things, by which the soul, if not altogether depraved
from its original nature, is awakened to the Beauty of the
original unity,
Ideas.
Ethics.
S.
and
discipline
not sufficient by
it is,
itself
to assure
path to follow.
In treating of virtue on its practical side, Plotinus differs
from his Stoical predecessors chiefly in the stress he lays on
the interpretation even of civic virtue as a preliminary, means
of purifying the soul from admixture with body. The one
point where he decidedly goes beyond them in the way of
precept
cases'.
is
Here he returns
if
open."
1
Erin. V. 8, 2.
'
Of.
etT]
Enn.
eiiSatixoveiv
I.
4, 7
'
:
dXX'
el
Enn.
i.
9.
ianv
68hs i^iivai,
el fii)
92
to the State.
[CH.
affected
ground of appeal
by the loss of a single unit as to make
use of is sub-N
makes
clearly rational. The argument Plotinus
Pythagoreans.
the
from
stantially that which Plato borrowed
To take a violent mode of departing from the present life
will not purify the soul from the passions that cling to the
composite being, and so will not completely separate it and
set it free from metempsychosis. Through not submitting to
its appointed discipline, it may even have to endure a worse
lot in its next life^ So long as there is a possibility of making
this
progress here,
it is
in
is
better to remain.
principle, in Aristotle.
and now
it;
is
the
The
in Plotinus
it
Stoics
had
leads to a
persistently enforced
still
higher degree of
Pordetachment, culminating as we
someof
the
virtues
by
his
master
phyry made the gradation
what more explicit; and lamblichus was, as Vacherot has remarked^, more moderate and practical in his ethical doctrine;
but invariably the attitude of the school is one of extreme
inwardness. Not only is the inner spring that by which moral
action is to be tested; the all-important point in relation both
to conduct and insight is to look to the true nature of the
soul and, keeping this in view, to rid it of its excrescences.
First in the order of moral progress are the " political " virtues,
which make the soul orderly in the world of mixture. After
these come the "cathartic" virtues, which prepare it to
ascend to the ideal world. Positive virtue is attained simply
shall see in mysticism.
by the
el
Enn.
/ii},
I.
(Sffirep
9:
icaX el
<j>aiJ,iii,
elfm/t/iivos
Enn.
I.
2, 4.
irpi toi/tou
dvajKalov.
t. ii.
p. 62.
oix eiiTux^s,
OF PLOTINTJS
V]
93
as unjust
all, political
is
in the world ^.
iii.
'
Enn.
T^ awbSif Kal ry
*
Enn.
Enn.
v. 5, 3.
(jipoveiv IbvTiiiv
iv
2, p. 605.
VI. 8, 5.
Cis
els
to
lis
els h>
tQ
94
[CH.
{irolr/at^)
and action
man
or of nature,
is
act,
may
possess a good
it,
its
is
possession
is
only in the
tree.
This produces
all
the manifold
life
Still less is it
it.
Yet, as he also
insists,
applicable to the
to speak of the
One before
first principle
terms.
have no need of
it,
want of
it,
Enu. in.
8, 1
iraffoxres
dii
t^ Trpiln-qv wplv
tAos toCto
l-nxeipuv (rrovSi^iv
^XiireLy,
.ap'
S,v
el
X^oi/icx
Tis i.v&axoi'ro
rh
Enn.
m.
Seaplas tA
'
Enn. m.
f/ieive
Trdi/Ta.
8, 10: oSt?)
Si airii
oi)
toIvw irapiaxe
li^v
iW ipxh
ttjs
ttoWt) oSaa,
<t>VTt^
t^v
iroXMlv',
OF PLOTINUS
V]
95
Here Plotinus
is
of metempsychosis.
future
life,
As
in
Plotinus, however, as
*
treis
Enn. VI.
5,
12
ilXXA toC
firj
Enn.
ra. 6, 6.
oi
ykp
ix toO ovtos
ijr
i)
irpo<r5i)(n;
oidiv
yip
ixelpif irpocrflij-
&to!.
Enn.
i.
1, 12.
Enn.
iv. 3, 32.
Enn.
iv. 4, 1.
96
divisions.
intellect is
[CH.
not in relation to
'
commits much to
oblivion.
We
not.
Happiness belongs to the life of being, and this is incommensurable Avith the parts of time. Is one to be supposed
happier for remembering the pleasure of eating a dainty
yesterday
or, say,
if
the question
memory
is
of in-
of having had
deeds which he has not himself had the opportunity of perHence (as the Stoics also held against Aristotle)
length of life is not necessary for its moral perfection 2.
forming.
in
is
allotted his
I.
5.
1.
5,
Bt iv
fOUTj
'
Tra/jardtret
10 : t6 di
ian
(iSi ivepyijffai.
Enn.
m.
4.
iy
rah
particular genius or
is
that the
xp^^ov rb eiSaifioveTv
irp&^cai ri eiSai/iovelv TlScaSai
TtS^i-Toi-
i]
yd,p
Mpyaa
Ti/iSis
Sal/iovos.
daemon
of
?|w
rijs
(ppovrjirai
fctti
iv rots
"
OF PLOTINUS
V]
each of us
is
97
life
we masters
he suggests
is,
that by
its
is
The explanation
and disposition
all
" there,"
in general every-
K^fnoi
W.
CHAPTEK
VI
is
On
illustration.
desire.
myth
it
makes plain
what is
myth
the
set
of Eros, he
to
if
The
distinction
extent by Plotinus
^to
Eun. IV.
3, 14:
roCra
/ici/
oiv Swij
ns
Sofdfet, d\X'
Sn
Enn.
Xiyovffi.,
m.
ol
tuv ovtuv
6/iou
fiepl^eu/ xp^voa i
/i^ ojto, rd^ci Se ij Svvd/ien
VI]
99
grasp.
is
its
relation
The myths are completely plastic in the hands of the philosophers. Of their original meaning, no doubt they have a less
keen sense than Plato, who saw the real hostility of a naturalistic "theogony" like that of Hesiod to his own type of
thought; but this only shows how dominant the philosophical
point of view has become. Plato could not yet treat the myths
of Greek religion so arbitrarily as would have been necessary
for his purpose, or did not think it worth while. For the NeoPlatonists the poetic mythology has become like their own
"matter," absolutely powerless to modify the essence of
thought, but equally ready to take on an elusive reflexion of
own plane,
its
all this
on the
subject, though, as
Porph. V.
Plot. 10:
Udvom
ir/Jos
iKeivom.
72
'
100
THE MYSTICISM
[CH.
It
is
"opinion" that
is sufficient
up to
first,
the
dis-
it
are:
cursive " reason " that thinks out one thing adequately from
it
V. Pht. 23.
mh.
ii.
The
difference
2.
is
that Plotinus
d. Enn.
vi. 7, 2.
OF
VI]
101
PL0TI2SrFS
siderable treatise^ in
sixth
which he
Ennead
is
criticises first
placed a con-
on the
commentary
its
Eun.
Enn.
'
The doctrine of categories elaborated by Plotinus being for the most part
1.
3.
Ilepi SiaXeKTLK^s.
VI. 1-3.
tov ovtos.
'
Zeller,
iil.
2,
pp. 523-4.
Enn.
I.
3, 6.
THE MYSTICISM
102
[CH.
Even
known in intuitive
something remaining still. The One and
is
is
thought, there
is
is
attained,
and being
unattainable.
to
make
it
recognisable
also attain
it
themselves.
is sought is one, he who would have the
must have gone back to the principle of unity in
himself; must have become one instead of many^. To see it,
we must entrust our soul to intellect, and must quit sense and
phantasy and opinion, and pay no regard to that which, comes
vision of
it
'
Enn.
VI. 9, 3.
OF PLOTINUS
VI]
103
(avveaii) not
While
but it can retreat to it
in alternation with the life of knowledge and virtue which is
the preparation for it. "And this is the life of gods and of
godlike and happy men, a deliverance from the other things
here, a life untroubled by the pleasures here, a flight of the
alone to the alone."
These are the concluding words of the Enneads in Porphyry's redaction. In another book, which comes earlier but
as the centre of the soul touching the centre of all*.
was written
more psychologically
Enn.
VI. 9, 4: oi
irapeivai i,\\'
-rj
yap
Sii
ra S\\a, dXX'
(<tti, Tifi
wore irapov
C. 0. 7 : oi
pj^
yhp
t^
idvvaTovPTt oi irdpeffTiv.
'
Enn.
VI. 9, 7
el
/iAXei
"An
Enn.
VI. 9, 10,
Enn.
V. 3.
irpiirijs.
dXXa aXXos
a(jy>jv
rplnros toB
Kal aranis.
THE MYSTICISM
104
[CH.
body
First the
ciple is reached.
is
to be taken
till
the prin-
away
as not
plurality
self;
self-sufficing,
is
ledge; but
mind
its
it
is,
Take away
by the
How
is
this to be done?
all*.
most
all
real is as if
are not.
To think the
things of
all their
Uves
should put trust in what they saw in their dreams, and, if one
were to wake them up, should distrust what they saw with
open eyes and go oft to sleep again*. Men have forgotten what
even from the beginning until now they desire and aspire
after.
"For
all
necessity of nature, as
if
it
by
it
This
Enn.
is
SKm
<t>OTis iKclvov
Enn.
V. 5, 11.
Trdiira.
-
Enn.
v. 5, 12.
OF PLOTINUS
VI]
105
thought, and
makes Philo here the sole predecessor of Plowe may ask, whence came the notion to Philo
The combination of the mo^ complete "imma-
tinus^., But,,
himself?
nence " in one sense with absolute transcendence of Deity in
more
and to Plotinus
of "ecstasy"
is
mode
sober
alike,
came from
Plato.
in
During the period of almost exclusively ethical thinking, between Aristotle and revived Pythagoreanism and Platonism, hints of the kind naturally found little response. After
logue.
above beauty to
its
is
is
1 iii. 2,
2
3.
Cf.
Porph.
F. Plot. 23.
'
Enn.
tV M^" ^X""
S6vaiuv
els
t6 voeiv, ^
iv airif /SX^irei, riip bi, y rk liriKeiva, airov ^tti/SoX^ tiw Kal irapaSoxS) KtS'
Trpdrcpop iiipa fi6vov Kal bpSiv iiarepov Kal
ij
64a voO
ipav.
els
vow fo^e
Srav
Kal iv
icrri
Koi
lanv
ixelvii iJ^v
to,
w nal
toO
106
its
[Vl
of view.
sophy
may
Plato's
own age
essentially
cults,
it
found
find
take up at last
its
successors of Plato.
CHAPTER
VII*
1.
Both for his own and for succeeding times, the name of Porphyry stands out conspicuous among the disciples of Plotinus.
Eunapius, writing towards the end of the fourth century,
observes that Plotinus is now more in the hands of educated
readers than Plato himself; and that, if there is any popular
knowledge of philosophy, it consists in some acquaintance
He
Porphyry's knowledge of
elSo<;
all liberal
irapaXeKonro)!;); of which
in his extant
works and
T<p
alvtyiiaTiidei,
warep
'Bp/iaiici}
irdvTa
els
ns aeipk
Tum
o /iiv
yap IIXutikos
Kal Suffijxoos
6 di Tloptl>ipios,
iraiBeLa.-
THE DIFFUSION
108
returned to
Rome; and
it
was
in
[CH.
Rome, according
to Euna-
The
letter is
an exhortation to perseverance
is full
in
its
Daniel
it
historical events
of
its
if
events subsequent
it
'
ireireuriJtivtpi
<To>
iv
ffol
"
Ad
Cf. Jules
pp. 98-9.
o.
xSs
9:
oiv
t. ii.
KaffrjyefJiAva,
ttjv ireiilav
KiXt^ivai
arorov r^v
Trpos riiv
toO iipriyriToS
Marcellam, 24:
oiiK
ye dTroXXto
t. ii.
ffKidr, lit
Sri
Tor irXovTov;
Kenparivda
(cai
ital
irepi
p. 181.
9eoC"
irtirns,
"L'on peu
OF NEO-PLATONISM
vn]
109
and
also
Zostrianus,
own
doctrines
were those of the ancient Zoroaster^. The spirit of critical inquiry thus aroused in Porphyry seems to have led him more
and more to take the sceptical view about all claims to par-
ticular revelations
Nymphs
make no mention
but
who wrought
is
wisdom"
such a cavern,
it
juger," says the historian on the preceding page, "par I'indignation m6me que
oet ouvrage excita dans I'ifiglise, de rimportance et de la gravity des attaques
qu'il contenait."
1
iird
T&v
TTju aXpeffLv
i/6ffov
re Kal viov ri
ffvarftaafi^uv
els
Od.
xiii.
102-112.
|Si|8Xioc
rapaSeiKvm
TerXcurfjiirov re
THE DIFFUSION
110
[CH.
Of
all
far-
down
it sufficed,
by a few words at
"
the opening, to set going the whole discussion on " universals
more
most extensive
eijL^vxo>v),
still
represented in the
still more systematically by later NeoPlatonism. The real importance of the writings in which he
set forth the doctrine of his school was due, however, as his
contemporaries recognised, to the insight with which he penetrated to his master's essential thought
and to
his lucidity in
vn]
OF NEO-PLATONISM
111
which
about
the soul looks up as patterns. Our
the virtues of the second class, seeing that they are to be
acquired in this life. Through them is the ascent to the contemplative virtues of soul and to those that are their models in
pure intellect. The condition of purification is self-knowledge
When the soul knows itself, it knows itself as other than
the corporeal nature to which it is bound. The error to which
we are especially liable is ascription of the properties of body
to incorporeal being. The body of the world is everywhere
spatially, its parts being spread out so that they can be discriminated by the intervals between them. To God, Mind and
care
must be
chiefly
"^.^
being
whole.
is
The union
of an incorporeal
altogether peculiar^. It
is
Sententiae, 34.
'
Tp6iros.
a.
6:
oii
ri votoOv
els
aWo
ij
/u^is,
ij
ffiyoSos,
and
all.
What
dW
Srepos
^ irapiiBens
a iroiet' dXXA Kal rd
and
Preller
Whether by
THE DIFFUSION
112
as
appears to be added
[CH.
in departing
locality or relation
is
really
in
of bodies,
of
They
souls in one.
all
many
accompanies the timeless cognition of intellect. In such process, however, the earlier thought does not go out to give
place to the later. It appears to have gone out, but it remains; and what appears to have come in is from the movement of the soul returning on itself*.
Thus
psychological subtleties'
is
physical causation.
^
Sententiae, 41
'
/tar'
oiaiav,
firetaoSi.ibdTis
airov
krepirrqi,
t)
d7rofco7re?(rat,
fua
'
'
Kal irdXiv
devripuv
oiiK
"
KivovfiipTis,
To
^ux^
Iweiffiv.
d^i/coTO
S'
dXXd
r^i"
A*t^""fttiai7raffac,
iWaxtiiev
airo^jiirif,
a^TroXXal^ i'vXV
Sententiae, 44:
vc^fiara'
'
ii
o^de diroKepfiaTitratrat eh
iciiicXif)
els
els
a ^ei Kara
iavriir dxo/SXufoi/ffj;
is
/ii^pos.
irtiyj
S'
atnrep
els iaiiriiii
ydp hixev
ofe
OF NEO-PLATONISM
VII]
is
113
succession.
clearness of exposition,
him
in
we may go on
a more distinctive
Plotinus,
to a
light.
though personally an
ascetic, laid
no
stress in his
upon
no suggestion
may
be borne quietly
There
is
in the
of
a doctrine
andrie,
t. ii.
p. 156), referring to
Simon
(26),
says that,
Enn. ni. 6, 5.
Eunapius, in the introduction to his Lives, says of Apollonius that he is
not to be counted as a mere philosopher, but rather as something between the
rjv n $eu)v re Kai apffpiirov i>i(rov).
gods and man {oixin ipMaoipos d
'
w.
THE DIFFUSION
114
idea of justice
it
is
beyond them to
kill
[CH.
is
do who refuse to
account of the origin of laws. The primitive legislator perand other men, who had not perceived it
first,
to
its
the things of the mind^ The life of the body generally, and
such matters as diet in particular, cannot safely be left unregulated by reason. The more completely they are put in
order once for all, the less attention they will occupy, and
the freer the mind will be for its own life. The Epicureans
have to some extent recognised this in advising abstinence
from
De
Abst.
1.
42.
The
theories of
some
Si oUaBoj. KOTO t^k oXaBtitnv itaSawbiiaiov vpbs tois cotitois ivepyeiv iroXXois
rum
/So/j/Sd/KDK iJeTpaxiJXiirei'.
ital
OF NEO-PLATONISM
vn]
From
115
who would be
things*.
came to be
make
sacrificed because
first offerings
fruits.
to the gods of
all
to
show that the least costly sacrifices with purity of mind are
the most pleasing to the gods. Porphyry disclaims any intention of overthrowing established customs; but remarks
that the laws of the actual State allow private persons to offer
To make an
from which we
would undoubtedly be unholy; but we are
not required to do it. We too must sacrifice, but in accordance
life.
ourselves abstain
with the nature of the different powers. To the God over all,
as a certain wise man^ said, we must neither offer nor even
Some
garding them.
of those
who
here,
ternals.
own
our
^
ovn
'
offering, to their
DeAbst.
ii.
11
elxdrus
add contemplation, as
Oe6tppa(rTos &Tayope6ei
iiA]
tiJj
eiffepetr i8i\oyTas.
This
there
is
is
sacrifices.
'
Apollonius of Tyana, as
is
82
THE DIFFUSION
116
[CH.
He who cares about piety knows that to the gods none but
expounded by some
who are really the causes of quite the opposite. After this,
they turn us to entreaties and sacrifices to the beneficent gods
as if they were angry*. They inflame the desires of men with
ills
and wars. And, what is most terrible, they reach the point of
persuading them that all this has been stirred up by the
highest God. Nor are the philosophers altogether blameless.
For some of them have not kept far enough apart from the
ideas of the multitude, who, hearing from those that appeared
wise things in harmony with their own opinions, were still
further encouraged in unworthy thoughts about the gods.
f
If cities must propitiate such powers, that is nothing to us
{ovBev irpdi rjfiai;). For by these wealth and external and
bodily things are thought to be goods and deprivation of
them an evil, and they have little care about the soul. The
same position must be taken as regards divination by the
entrails of victims. This, it may be said, will be done away
with if we refrain from killing and eating animals. Why not,
kill men also for the purpose? It is said that better
premonitions are to be got in that way, and many of the
barbarians really practise this mode of divination. As a
then,
'
De
De
and greed'.
Abst.
ii.
37-43.
Abel.
ii.
40:
&yadoepyu)v Beujv
'
De
Abst.
avaifmv rbv
ii.
Cjs
Tp4irov<rlv
fitri.
toCto
fTrl
XiTweios
iiftas
(bpyiafiivuv.
61:
dW
rb &\oyov
f^joj/
rb fvcxa fuarrelai
atpirreiv /lavrelas
hexa
iSixov.
01"
VII]
NEO-PLATONISM
117
we
among
themselves.
DeAbst.
^rial
ndWos
ii.
rod airoKpiTopos.
2
De
Abet.
ii.
60: iyvoovaw Sk
ia/iir
KaKuv
ol t\)v
eio-i)707o;',
SeiffiSai/wvlav, Tpvipifv,
T'iji'
iSiKlair.
itrSK-n^iy rod
^
THE DIFFUSION
lis
there i?
[CH,
Even
if
we
pass over
some of the stories about men that are said to have understood
the tongues of animals, enough is recorded to show that the
voices of birds and beasts, if intently listened to, are not
wholly unintelligible. Voiceless animals too, such as fishes,
come to understand the voices of men; which they could not
do without some mental resemblance. To the truth of
mean
to treat
ruthlessly'?.
for their
life.
amounts to
'
been
said, learn
it is
by being taught,
as
we
do.
They have
vices
and the
difficult their
De
Abst.
iii.
De
Abst.
iii.
dW i
ttpoLs, 6 5^
dyviiifMy
irXeovc^if.
Kal ruis
net> eiyvilinav
kclI Avicrr6p7]Tos
irplv elweiv 6
^AXei,
airuv
tftiperat
ffvvepyuv airou t^
Sia/3oXeo
ets airlt
a KaraK/mTai' ut
'\lffov irptyjipitfrai.
'
De
<l>i(rei
Abst.
iii.
iarl Xcr/iKi.
10: 6 Si
tjiiaeL
X^ay Sn
OF NEO-PLATONISM
vn]
119
while they are of no use to us, they sometimes make their prey
of men. This they do driven by hunger, whereas we in our
senses
in reasoning
We
Porphyry next
men by
and above
by
ceptions.
their reasonings,
The
by
their sense-per-
is
in degree of fineness.
of animals,
and im-
their desires
all
less prone to injure our fellowcannot indeed live in need of nothing, like the
divinity; but we can at least make ourselves more like God
by reducing our wants. Let us then imitate the "golden
race," for which the fruits of the earth sufficed.
We
men.
'
De
Abst.
iii.
20.
iveppiiirBri Kal
S' T}fiipov
/jlcv
t4
(poviKii'
TrXeiiTTOi'
Kal 6tipiwdes
dTr^/i/SXwac ol
TOVTO ToX/i^aoKTes.
ol
aXKijKiiiv
diii^effi
De
Abst.
iii.
25.
fieKiTtiv
t)
ipiait aiSrois
ivayiiviov
;"^
THE DIFFUSION
120
[CH^
The fourth book, which is incomplete, acciunulates testimonies to show that abstinence from flesh is not a mere
eccentric precept of Pythagoras
Porphyry returns to the general ascetic arguOne who would philosophise ought not
to live like the mass of mankind, but ought rather to observe
such rules as are prescribed to priests, who take upon them-
third century,
ment
for abstinence.
This is the strain in which the work breaks off, but it will
be observed that on the whole the point of view is as much
humanitarian as ascetic. Transmigration of human souls into
the bodies of animals Porphyry explicitly denied. Here he
mentions it only as a topic of ridicule used against Pythagoras.
The stories of men who have been transformed into animals,
he interprets as a mythical indication that the souls of animals
have something in common with our own. The way in which
the whole subject is discussed reveals a degree of reflectiveness
with regard to it in the ancient schools which has scarcely been
reached again by civilised Europe till quite modern times.
And perhaps, for those who wish to preserve the mean, no
more judicious solution will be found than Plutarch came
upon incidentally in his Life of Cato the Censor; where he
contends that, while justice in the proper sense is applicable
only among men, irrational animals also may claim a share
of benevolence^.
De
eirAa/ipdi/ovaav
"
Tij)
Si/foioeriJoijs
SiKof^j
xdpiTOj ^(mv
ffre
TrKariTepov
'"' aXliyav
OF NEO-PLATONISM
vn]
2.
lamblichus,
lamblichus.
He was
121
Porphyry
had been
was
activity as a teacher
in Syria.
He
and
Rome.
own later
his piipil at
him
as socially
genial,
and
as living
it
altogether
fails
it is
1 See Julian, Or. vn. 222 b, where Plotinus, Porphyry and lamblichus are
mentioned in order aa carrying on the tradition of Plato.
8 Eunap. Vitae (lambUchus): 6 /iiy dTOT7)<ras i/ias oix fjv axapis, ravra di
'
oix oikui
Ix^i.
THE DIFFUSION
122
[CH,
we
all
vol
'
fj
see,
'Ebri
fioi,
o#; Toirav
yap
(<pri,
'
6 ttXoiJo-ios
17
&diKos
^ ctSlxov KKnpovbiuts,
p.i(rov oiSiv.'
bom
(331). He therefore follows Dodwell ("A Discourse conTime of Pythagoras," cited by Fabrioius, Bibliotheca Graeca] in
regarding them as spurious. DodweU gives what seems a decisive reason for
Julian was
cerning the
Constantine,
VII]
philosopher.
OF NEO-PLATONISM
123
He modified the doctrine of Plotinus more deeply
And, while
and freely
be given by an abstract of the second book the ProBut first a word must be said on the kind of modification he made in the doctrine of Plotinus.
will
trepticus.
From
it is
known
that hei
by
resolving
them
method much
and
As there are
is
that
he illustrates the continuous effort of the school towards completeness and consistency. He dwelt with special emphasis on
the position that the causal process from higher to lower is
logical, and not in time; and thought it not without danger to
suppose a temporal production of the world even as a mere
hypothesis. More explicitly than Plotinus or Porphyry, he
insisted that no individual soul can remain permanently in
the intelligible world any more than in Tartarus. It is the
nature of every particular soul to descend periodically and to
* The genuineness of one of these (Ta SeoKoyoitf^va t^s ipLdiainKijs) has
been contested. The other two bear the titles Uepl ttjs koivtjs im9rii>.aTiKris
iwurr^/iTIi and Hepl t^s SiKO/idxov &pi6firiTiKijs daaynrfii. See, on the former,
Appendix
III.
THE DIFFUSION
124
[QH.
how can
what seemed
versally allowed,
It
a thinker
yvas
and was
who
definitively taken
deserted
all
We
that
course of things.
wisdom
{a-o<f)ia)
theology.
as
without the wisdom to use them are not goods, or rather are
evils. Things in use {ra ^^pT^/iara) have reference to the body,
and the body is to be attended to for the sake of the soul and
its
ruling powers.
soul
'
is
Procl. in
Tim. 341 d;
Protrepticus, u. 2, ed.
wph
ed. Diehl
ij
H.
^vx^
iii.
el de
ii
Trpoalpens
,'
Pistelli, p. 10:
<pi.\o(ro^lat wcuSelav.
/xuirrriplav
t4
OF NEO-PLATONISM
VII]
126
mind
life is
determinate. It
is
itself
it
Unlike other
scientific pursuits, it
and
demands no
it.
special ap-
place.
After further elaborating this argument, lamblichus proceeds to infer from " common notions " that insight {ippovrjo-i^)
most to be chosen for itself, and not for the sake of other
Suppose a man to have everything else and to suffer
from a malady in the part of him that has insight, life would
not be for him a gift to choose, for none of its other goods
is
things.
Protr. 6, p. 31
rijJ
5'
cla-i
Kiv^ms
ol toC iravris
1/
THE DIFFUSION
126
[CH.
Now
be perfected'.
in
human development
is
the
mental
insight
Frotr. 8, p. 45:
(ppovovvTi,
'
A yip
oix alperbs i
'
rdvra
(I>e6ya
yip a
toi'
yiyfiiffxei,
tfiiaei
etij
'
koI
|SIos
Si
Trji yevlireojs
(rvvexSs.
rqi/
yiveaai witpvKO'
OF NEO-PLATONISM
vn]
127
returned whence
that philosophising
is
but the separation of the soul from the body to live a life by
itself. Our soul can never perceive truth in its purity till it is
released. To prepare it for such knowledge, and to approach
that knowledge as near as possible while
purify the soul from all that comes to
we
live,
we must
by
in
new
is
immortal, there
is
An account
adapted from the seventh
book of the Republic. The Platonic view is enforced that the
special function of philosophy is to remove from the soul the
accretion that comes to it from birth, and to purify that
energy of it to which the power of reason belongs^. The argument of the Gorgias is then taken up, that the intemperate
soul, which would be ever getting and spending, is like a
cerpt of the celebrated passage in the Tkeaetetus.
of the ideal philosophic education
is
Protr. 16, p. 83: tA yap vepuupeTv rnr yiveffiv diri t^s ^ux^s
TJJK XoYifeo-flot
irponiiKei,,
icoi
iKKadalpeiv
THE DIFFUSION
128
[CH.
this topic,
is
the most
to be spent in learning
it.
An
art of
and to
be a worker with the true law of human life, he must have
acquired the directive knowledge that can only be given by
for
philosophy.
one were to
if
lessness.
deprived of
arises
human
life
power to dissolve
the
common good
rlvos &
*
of
\6yov
ij
all, is
aff
(pyov iptaros
ylyiie<r6ai.
^ ii iiio/das tc
justice
yap
-iiyeiTai jSao-iX^o yj
ianv.
etiiiu,
li^Ai/wj
iSv.
OE NEO-PLATONISM
vn]
failed.
such great
129
own
The
evils,
life.
all
of
eiriBpofj-rji;
the solutions of
those that
The
fell
interpretations contain
is
literal
The
retained.
many
points of interest.
If
last given,
understood to command abstinence from animal food, is interpreted simply as inculcating justice with fit regard for
what is of kindred nature and sympathetic treatment of the
life that is like our own^. The absence of any reference to the
literal meaning seems to indicate that lamblichus did not
"
follow Porphyry on this point. In interpreting the " symbols
what
he
is
fairly
relating to theology, if the whole of
says
considered, he seems to give them a turn against credulity;
his last
which
is
ticularly that
'
'
iiitj/ix""
At^X""
'
^"'^
TOLavra irXeiova.
2
w.
THE DIFFUSION
130
The precept
[CH.
you may understand the nature of demonstraand then there will be no room for mistrust.
what is meant in reference to the gods^. The
ledge, so that
tive evidence,
That
also
is
man
tracked out by
is
to be preferred
way
it is taken*. The
Pythagorean p^losophy, with its appeal
to equality and proportion, on the virtue of justice (t^j;
Te\eioTdrT)v aperijv) is dwelt on*. Then, in nearing the end,
is
human judgments on
"symbol," which
is
is
fiijSh eaviMurrbv iirtirrei /iriSi repi Bcluv Soy/iiTui'' .wpoTpiTrei lierthat xal KTocrBiu
ixeiva
lX<'v
t4 ixaBiinaTa
/col
oiijf
rds iiruTTJinovucai
Bedv Koi
Trepi
Belav SvYpArav
diroScifeis.
SuirflijpoTos
JcoJ
'
t4
a-iifiara
vprniyoviihut imaKOTOViihrp,
vn]
OF NEO-PLATONISM
131
envy or of joy in others' ill, since it sholrs that men are all
akin and of like affections and subject in common to unforeseen changes of fortune.
Whence
it
3.
for
some time
later,
be employed by Christian
rulers.
Eustathius, another of
The
who was an
death of Julian, were stiU for the most part obliged to resort
to the philosophical schools for their scientific culture*.
contest in the world, however, was
now
The
effectively decided,
i/tiXijTMC
SieKpi0ri<rav els
'
92
THE DIFFUSION
132
Pergamum
in Mysia.
[OH.
him
logical
satisfied; those
inquiries found
him
He
irresponsive as a statue.
no illusion in the most clear-sighted of the philosophers. Chrysanthius, one of his instructors in the Neo-Platonic philosophy,
join
him
in the
The Emperor
neverthe-
less conferred
worship, he altered as
little
is
it is
sophic schools. Who now, asks the Christian Father, reads Plato or Aristotle?
" Busticanos vero et piscatores nostros totus orbis loquitur, universus mundus
sonat."
" Eunap. Vitae (Maximus).
Melite was a kinswoman of Eunapius, and
Chrysanthius became his teaeher in philosophy.
vnj
OF NEO-PLATONISM
133
Pythagorean masters^.
make
with Maximus^.
during his
visit to Greece, in
yvaaSAai
Or. vn. 239 bc:
dWA. Koi
Tot!
x?h<">^9<u..
[CH.
THE DIFFUSION
134
many
by the
We
and uninterrupted
is
as illustrating the
Xpifovs Tois
liv
Kal
els ^^iJ/Sous
724
' Zeller,
iii.
2, pp.
iii.
2, p. 737, n. 1.
Zeller,
is
^pn
ko.t'
iKclvow
toiJs
TeXwi'.
fi.
OF NEO-PIATONISM
VII]
135
et
Mundo^. Thfs
Sallust, as Zeller"
proved against doubts that had been raised, was certainly the
friend of Julian known from the Emperor's Orations and
from references in the historians; and the book may have
been put forth with a popular aim as a defence of the old
religious system now restored and to be justified in the light
of philosophy.
noteworthy point in
it is
sacrifices.
traditional religion,
jectively useful to
it is
men, and
rational interpretation.
happiness even
another
if
would be
sufficient for
it
in
life.
it is
Philosophy, vol.
i.
Edited by Orelli, with Latin version and notes, in 1821, and included in
MuDach's Fragmenta Philoaophorum Oraecorum, vol. iii. (1881).
^
" iii. 2,
p. 734.
CHAPTER
YIII
Roman
new
re-
by the Greeks, or
who may
angels, as
either be
by the Jews.
visible form.
remarks, has in
common
with Christianity
its stories
of in-
in Scythia
of.
and of Rhampsinitus
among the Egyptians. Among the Greeks too there are cases
men have been represented as raised to
in which mortal
Noah's flood may have been borrowed from Deuand the idea of Satan from the Greek Titanomachies.
The more intelligent Jews and Christians are ashamed of much
in Biblical history, and try to explain it allegorically. What
divinity.
calion's,
is
better, because
vni]
Plato holds
137
difficulty there
of heaven. He
never to Be returned for evil.
The reproach of idolatry against the non-Judaic religions is a
calumny. Statues are not regarded as deities, but only as aids
to devotion. To the highest God, as all agree, only the worship
of the mind ought to be offered. But why should not hymns
is
for a rich
is
all
the varied
the Christians could find support for some of their own positions
ApoUonius of Tyana
who, condemning blood-offerings as he did on more radical
grounds than themselves, was yet put forward by the apologists of paganism as a half-divine personage. So far did this
go that Hierocles, the Proconsul of Bithynia who wrote
against the Christians in the time of Diocletian, gave his
ecclesiastical antagonist Eusebius occasion to treat the part
of his book that dealt with ApoUonius as the only part worth
replying to. And Porphyry, in whom the Christians saw their
most dangerous adversary, himself made a distinct claim to
in the appeal to religious reformers like
Christians, to
be spoken of
later.
THE POLEMIC
138
[CH.
what we should now call religious as distinguished from philosophical liberty in the matter of food and of sacrificing. Nor
was any objection usually raised by the authorities to reforming sects that aimed at personal holiness. The Roman
Government even looked upon it as part of its own function
to repress savage rites, such as human sacrifices. Whence
then sprang the repugnance almost uniformly to be observed
in the statesmen, philosophers and men of letters who were
brought into contact with the new religion? For they were
quite prepared to appreciate a monotheistic worship, and to
real prospect of
moral
re-
form.
We
culture
haps this
It
is
is
those, he adds,
The
shorter path
and not
is,
difficult; requiring
will. Of
were the elder Cynics like Diogenes. The
true as distinguished from the false Cynic remained, in fact,
for Julian as for Epictetus, a hero among philosophers. This
was part of the Stoical tradition continued into Neo-Platonism. And, as we know, it was a commonplace with philosophic preachers to make light of mental accomplishments as
compared with moral strength. Besides, the Christians had
greater
those
who took
less
it
"Ep/wv
of rhetorical training
B tCk p-qTopmSiv
ol Sv<Ti).a94irraToi
koI
rijs
AGAINST CHRISTIANITY
vra]
139
new types of the fanatical monk and the domineering ecclesiastic were definitely in the world, and we may
see by the expressions of Eunapius the intense antipathy they
century, the
Roman
is
"Do
Roman
official;
gists of the
of the
is
Empire 2.
A verse
the view of the Church, was the prophet that Moses foretold,
'
ftwaxodst ivOpdmovs
fJi^y
iros
daxVI'^o''"''"
THE POLEMIC
140
[CH.
whom it was said, "that every soul, which will not hear
that prophet, shall be destroyed from among the people"
(Acts iii. 23). The Church possessed the teachings of Christ,
of
and was a
tatively.
body with the right to declare them authoriThe true religion was not now, as under an earlier
living
dispensation, for one chosen race, but for the whole world.
Hence the whole world was bound to hear and to obey it.
The reply of Julian was that the application of the prediction
supposed to have been made was false. Moses never had the
least idea that his legislation was to be abrogated, but intended it for all time. The prophet he meant was simply a
prophet that should renew his own teaching of the law. The
law was for the Jews only, and the Christians had no claim to
represent them. The Jewish religion had its proper place as
one national religion among others. It was open even to those
it
to adopt
it
The
care of the
Jews about
own
as their
if
they
religious observances,
and
their
serve under other names. In this only are they in error, that
they arrogate to themselves alone the worship of the one true
God, and think that to us, "the nations," have been assigned
none but gods whom they themselves do not deign to regard
at
alli.
On
to
the ending of
all political
on the part of the Jewish community. The question as to the respective merits of Hebrew and Greek religion,
if no new question had arisen, would soon have been reduced
aspirations
'
Ep. 63
(ed. Hertlein).
dirdvoLav iirapd^vTes.
iXa^ovelq, ^ap^apiKy,
adds Julian,
AGAINST CHRISTIANITY
VIII]
141
all
divine truth.
is
cosmopolitan and
is
local
and
is
is an
bound
but
will
men
respect.
toleration to alP.
is
Both
where
no
utility
5^ Tel$e<r6ai
xM
THE POLEMIC
142
pious "
that
is
[CH.
Greek poets, historians and orators treat the gods with honour,
whereas the Christians speak dishonourably of them. It is unworthy of an educated or of a good man to teach one thing
and to think another. Let them either change their views
about the theology of the Greeks or confine themselves to the
exposition of their own".
rXifyaU oiSi tppejiv oiSi aUurfuf toO trci/iaros. oB9(s Si xal iroWdKii iro^ao'3
^Tri TJjx i\ri8TJ BeoaiPaav bpiMiUvoK /iriSiv iSixeiv tuv VaKiKalinv t4 irKifir),
Tois
firiSe iirvrlBeirBaj.
^
Ep.
7,
376 0:
*,Ep. 42.
(prj/il
Suv.
vni]
AGAINST CHRISTIANITY
143
schools of the
by
itself.
Marinus, in
124th year from the reign of JuUan." Thus the actual effect
of his resistance to that system of ecclesiastical rule which
afterwards, to those
appeared as a
who have
by which he meant
Of this the ancient religion was for him
the symbol. The myths about the gods are not to be taken
literally. The marriage of Hyperion and Thea, for exainple, is
a poetic fable i. What the poets say, along with the divine
element in it, has also much that is human ^. Pure truth,
unmixed with fable, is to be found in the philosophers, and
especially in Plato^- On the Jewish religion, the Emperor's
position sometimes appears ambiguous. He easily finds, in the
Old Testament, passages from which to argue that the God of
Israel is simply a tribal god like those of the nations. His
irapdSo^a
^
76.
137
SKKb.
tA, /nkv
/iriSi
idipnara.
tup voairwv
xofjoei)" idtrufiev
"
^i yip
lieri,
toO Selov
us of their own ancestors. This, he says, might have been ironical (as
evidently many took it to be) if put in the month of Socrates; but Timaeus,
to whom it is actually assigned, had no reputation for irony.
tell
THE POLEMIC
144
[CH.
could be found to illustrate the antithesis between "Hebrahe compares them to men seeing a
making of
National deities, whether to be called angels or gods, are interpreted as a kind of genius of each race. The various natural
aptitudes of peoples suppose a variety in the divine cause, and
which
is
at the
con-
^it
has
been beautifully reconstructed by C. J. Neumann*. A summary of the general argument will serve better than anything
else to make clear the spiritual difference that separated from
their Christian contemporaries the
rfj^
eio-e/SoO?
rmv Xpiffrtavuv
Cf.
^
oi)
vivTwv
ipSis
ivepmrot ^iirovrei
xadapiv, dXXo Tvp,
^plTrere, 4>opeur9e,
irup, ijMi,
BivoTos, liixaipa, poiupala, jroXXois dyd/uuri /dav i^riyoineiroi ri/r pXairnKipi xoS
3rt/pds
SOvafuv.
'
This idea, which we meet with also in Celsus, appears to have been
suggested by a passage in the Critiae, where such a distribution is described.
Cf. Prod, in Remp., ed. Kroll, i. 17.
'
'
Vm]
AGAINST CHRISTIANITY
6pr)(7KeLa<i)
145
by name^.
the text, pointed out that the saying "Father, forgive them"
in Luke xxiii. 34 is spurious. " The Apostate " had apparently
quoted
it
the Jews.
reply
is
to the
;.
vai$ 'K^yerat^
Neumann,
* Cf.
w.
Ep.
avyypdfinaTa
Muva^tas iypd^rf
rqs Mavirias TeKevTTJi itri
diroffiiferai.
78.
Neumann,
pp. 85-6.
10
THE POLEMIC
146
[CH.
(1
Peter
iii.
is
represented as
from the earth, are a diviner part of the universe, though it'
is not meant by this that the earth is excluded from divine
care. He entirely repudiates the fables about Cronos swallowing his children, and about the incestuous marriages of Zeus,
and so forth. But, he proceeds, the story of the Garden of
Eden
is
it is full
of blasphemy, since
it
it
represents
God
as forbidding
the bond of
is
human
possible immortality.
talking serpent
human race
of the
of God, there
or
'
Hebrew
AGAINST CHRISTIANITY
Vin]
147
moon and
Who
mouth?
Contrast now the opinions of the Hebrews and of the Greeks
about the relations of the Creator to the various races of mankind. According to Moses and all who have followed the
Hebrew tradition, the Creator of the world chose the Hebrews
for his own people, and cared for them only. Moses has no-
like
ras Tr^rpas,
102
THE POLEMIC
148
[CH.
altogether mythical.
And
yet those
who demand
that the
Greeks should believe the story of the tower of Babel, themselves disbelieve what Homer tells about the Aloadae, how
and
and customs
constitutions,
What
and insubordinate ways of the German tribes; the submissiveness and tameness of the Syrians and Persians and Parthians,
and, in a word, of all the barbarians towards the East and the
South?
and
political order,
and
is
not
Od.
xi.
316.
Vin]
AGAINST CHRISTIANITY
149
natural diversities
all
To suppose
these
appropriate to each,
by being
jealous
In proof that God did not care only for the Hebrews,
consider the various gifts bestowed on other peoples.
Were
among
THE POLEMIC
150
illustrious
[CH.
various heads,
philosophers, generals,
artificers,
lawgivers?
Romans,
his laws
for example,
under divine
their
The
delivered
the gods,
to the Christians,
have been under a harsh law with much of the barbarous in it,
humane laws, and would have been
worse in most things though better as regards religious purity
{wyvorepoi Se leal KaOapwrepoi ras a'yiareia<;). But now you do
not even know whether Jesus spoke of purity. You emulate
the angry spirit and bitterness of the Jews, overturning temples and altars and slaughtering not only those who remain
true to their paternal religion but also the heretics among
yourselves^. These things, however, belong to you and not to
your teachers. Nowhere did Jesus leave you such commands
instead of our mild and
or Paul.
^ Cf. Ep. 52, where Julian recaUs several massacres of "the so-called
heretics " (twv \eyoiiivuv alperiKuv) in the reign of his predecessor ConstantiuB.
Those who are called clerics, he says, are not content with impunity for their
past misdeeds; but craving the lordship they had before, when they could
deliver judgments and write wills and appropriate the portions of others, they
pull every string of disorder and add fuel to the flames (Trdi/ro Kipovatv d/totr/tios
KdXiav Kal rb Xeybfixvov wSp iwl irOp dx^eiovtxi).
their own.
AGAINST CHRISTIANITY
""n]
151
In war, in
of wisdom; but
may
For envy and jealousy are so far from angels and gods that
they do not extend even to the best men, but belong only to
the demons.
If the reading of your own scriptures is sufHcient for you,
why do you nibble at Greek learning? Why, having gone over
to the Hebrews, do you depart further from what their prophets declare than from our own manners? The Jewish ritual
is very exact, and requires a sacerdotal life and profession to
fulfil it. The lawgiver bids you serve only one God, but he
adds that you shall "not revile the gods" (Exod. xxii. 28).
The brutality of those who came after thought that not
serving them ought to be accompanied by blaspheming them.
This you have taken from the Jews. From us you have taken
the permission to eat of everything. That the earliest Christian
converts were much the same as those of to-day is proved by
what Paul says of them (1 Cor. vi. 9-11). Baptism, of which
the Apostle speaks as the remedy, will not even wash off
diseases and disfigurements from the body. Will it then re^
who
They say,
Christ.
Moses foretold
God only is
followed him.
But Moses
to be honoured. It
many
is
gods in this
sense; but he allows no second God comparable with the first.
The sayings usually quoted by the Christians from Moses and
THE POLEMIC
152
[CH.
God (Exod.
iv, 22),
6e6<;
Moses.
it is
to be perpetual.
That Jesus
is
Mark ventured
nor
^not
which
AGAINST OHKISTIANITY
VIII]
at
Rome, In
their adoration of
153
who said they were full of all uncleannfess (Matth. xxiii. 27).
Whence this comes, the prophet Isaiah shall say. It is the
old superstition of those who "remain among the graves, and
lodge in the monuments" (Is. bcv. 4), for the purpose of
divining
by dreams.
and handed
it
down
to their
successors.
truth
is
foolishness.
154
[CH.VIII
in the world.
cared, that
CHAPTER
IX
About
fifth century,
who
till
the
Strictly,
it
it
156
[CH.
beginning
with Hierocles,
belong in
how-
reality to the
Athenian succession'.
Plutarch died at an advanced age in 431. His successor
was Syrianus of Alexandria, who had been his pupil and for
some time his associate in the chair. Among the opinions of
Plutarch, it is recorded that with lamblichus he extends immortality to the irrational part of the soul, whereas Proclus
and Porphyry limit it to the rational part*. A psychological
position afterwards developed by Proclus may be noted in his
mode of defining the place of imagination (<f>avraa[a) between
1 See the note, pp. 9-10, in Gaisford's edition of the Commentary on the
Golden Verses, appended as a second volume to his edition of the Eclogues of
Stobaeus (Oxford, 1850).
" See Zeller, iii. 2, p. 852, n. 1, where it is shown that Olympiodorus the
commentator on Plato is identical with the Olympiodorus who wrote (later
than 564) the commentary on Aristotle's Meteorology. Olympiodorus the
still
is
of course
much
earlier.
many
Srineiacdii'
convenience as a conspectus, it may be given here; though qualificawhen we come to the subtleties, as will be seen in the case of
Proclus. Olympiodor. in Phaed. p. 98 Finckh: Sn ol fier 6.to rrjs Xoyuc^s
For
its
0i}(re(tis,
(lis
UXutTvos
ScoKpiTiis Kai
IJ^Xf"' ti^vit^ TTft
<p$eLpov<ri
^"X^'i
ykp
ivi
oirov
2irei<rnriros,
XoyiK^s,
Ti)v
S&^av,
(is
(is
np6(cXo$
iroXXoi
icaX
rtiiv
Jlop^6pu>s'
ol
HepiTaTtinKiSv
ol
IX]
thought
i.
157
then by
insistence
tarif's'
gether ceases.
When any
new
point of view,
it is
We now
come to the
Proclus.
f^jiorinfil
tj^ jpker .
last great
Philop. de
els Iv
An.
(Zeller,
awaSpoliei, tA Sk
iii.
tw
2, p. 751, n. 2).
iv tis
eliroi.
t4 SirmiUvov
hiKbv
els
riirovs
Zeller,
v. 10.
f
'
158
[CH.
By
his twenty-eighth
in addition to
many
other
is
celebrated,
and various
'
Ibid., 19:
cl
c.
'
(c.
The dates
roOro
Ibid., 17.
of his birth
he the fommnn
12.
Ibid., 15.
-j-p
and death
ttji/
roiruiv (so.
twv iji^&x.'^v)
otrias
^
x^P'"Ibid., 28.
are .fixed
36) that he died, at the age of 75, "in the 124th year
IX]
159
Marinus, 19
itoi
i]iji4piis
i( irujiavetas.
The
note in Cousin's edition {Prodi Opera Inedita, Paris, 1864) seems to give the
right interpretation: "'E| irupavelas, ex apparentia, sciUcet lunae, ut monet
Pabricius et indicant quae sequuntur." ZeUer (iii. 2, p. 784, n. 5) refers the
observance n apRc^al revelations from the goda to Proclus himself.
^ Ibid., 36: Kai iwl irairi toi5tois 6 iiayisTOTOi rplrov /iWov Trepiypatj/as t6tov,
t,
of the
Timaeus in
Ijatin translation.
160
He and
[CH.
in
some
respects
more of Hel-
ethics.
represented as
w^
that
is
still
in
Hades
is
rightly
and
apt for
things.
The jjggji^jjjjygijjJigj^
tp-pat^ Hfteds- is
there-
then
is
Where Plato
be admitted^.
^
MarinuB, 14-17.
'
Cf. Zeller,
iii.
to the portion of
is
it cited.
really a contention.
Zeller,
IX]
161
A large part of the activity of Proclus was given to commenting directly on Plato; but he also wrote mathematical
works 1, philosophical expositions of a more independent kind,
and Hymns to the Gods^, in whicK the mythological personages are invoked as representatives of the powers by which
the contemplative devotee rises from the realm of birth and
change to that of immutable being. Of the philosophical
works that do not take the form of commentaries on particular treatises, we possess an extensive one entitle d. Plafoni<^
Theolosv three shorter ones on Providence, Fate, and Evils,
made
in the thirteenth
(XToixeio)a-t<; eoXoyiic^).
All these
See,
on one
of these.
Appendix IH.
the
first
vTro6^tTfj3v)
Seven of these have been preserved. See |;he end of Cousin's collection.
Like Porphyry's De Antra Nympharum, they have a charm of their own for
*
those
who
<t>C\6iivBoi.
when
it
w.
11
1,62
[CH.
is
is
neu-
tralised
now to
not comprised in the
seems to have been generally misunderstood.
be expounded
treatise
it,
rendering into more precise subjective terms of Plato's meaning in the passage of the Republic where Socrates gives up the
'
'
At the extreme
say,
it
its
search.
we might
line re-
And
which
to the conception of a
strictly cognitive, is a
up
common
Cf.
R. P. 543; ZeUer,
iii.
2, p. 823.
Sep.
vi.
509.
iii.
2, p.
820.
Rep.
vi.
506.
IX]
than knowledge
since.
Put
its
in the
163
of the kind has
sensa of opinion
is
below
knowledge, belief as the apprehension of metaphysical principles is above it; because scientific knowledge,
if not attached to some metaphysical principle, vanishes
under analysis into mere relations of illusory appearances.
scientific
,,
The method
is
regarded as
germ
of the division
its
we
proceed..
rest,
and applied
"Siout fides, quae est credulitas, est infra intellectum; ita fides, quae est
vera fides, est supersubstantialiter supra soientiam et intellectum, nos Deo
immediate conjungens."
2 Enn. VI. 6, 8: rh ov wpwrov Set Xo/3c irpcSroK &, cIto vovv, elra rb fljioj'.
Cf. Zeller,
iii.
2, p. 793.
112
164
[CH.
this starting-point
The producing
One
The
first
Good
is
is
productive
is
produced {KpeirTov
is
its real
Tfj<;
all
tov irapayofievov
is
it
all beings. To add
by the addition, making it some partictdar good
instead of the Good simply.
If there is to be knowledge, there must be an order of
causation, and there must be a first in this order. Causes
cannot go in a circle: if they did, the same things would be
prior and posterior, better and worse. Nor can they go in an
to
therefore before
anj^hing
else is to
lessen it
deprived of being.
'
logical.
f<TTiv
OKTO
^
The order meant here is of course logical, not chronodepend on an actual first cause of their being.
ahla
wpiirri
iKclvrit, TO,
notion of a
first
ijs
Bi iro^juSyrepov.
'
IX]
165
other in spacei. That which can thus turn back upon itself,
has an essence separable from all body. For if it is inseparable
must
in essence,
it
still
its
is
in act.
" Beyond
all
bodies
is
all
and beyond all intellectual existences the One^" Intellect is unmoved and the giver of motion,
soul self-moving, body moved by another. If the living body
moves itself, it is by participation in soul. Similarly, the soul
through intellect participates in perpetual thought (fierexet
TOW aei voeiv). For if in soul there were perpetual thinking
primarily, this would be inherent in all souls, like self-motion.
Since not all souls, as such, have this power, there must be
before soul the primarily intelligent (rb TrptoTax! votjriKov).
though unmoved,
and
itself;
not
all
is
thinks
things in intellect.
all
it
{iM)vd<;)
which
the cause of
is
all
that
tol^k), there
is
is
ordered under
it.
in.
The
perfect
^
it
its
iireffTpitpSai
first.
perfect in
wphs
'6\ov.
et Ti
aCiiua,
apa
irphs
vpbs lavrb
i\ov
Kal d/iepit.
*
Ztoix- 0eoX. 20: t&vtihv auii&Twv iirixeivi i<mv ij 'f'vxvs oi<rla, xai raauiv
irixetya ii voepk ipitris, Kal Taauv tuv voepdv inroaTdaeuy iTriKetra tA ^i*.
\j/v)(Civ
'
166
of as
many things
of everything.
as
it
can; as the
The more
Good
[CH,
is,
of the
remains as
it
it is*.
like
itself
el
is
it
oiS^
yip
Stoix- 6eoX. 27
oi5
tov Tpo'CivTOs-
ii.iva
ydp,
6loi>
oiSi /icTdjSatris oi
irap'
aiiTd iffTiv.
' Sroijf.
TO
Si'
Tpdrra.
*
ISfToix-
liivijiv,
6eoX. 32
iraaa
wpbi 6 iviaToi(l>eTai,
d7roTXetTOi
tQv iiriaTpvpo-
IX]
all, all
In the great
167
circle to
is
caused remains in
its
own
and goes forth from it, and returns to it'. The remaining {fiovrj) signifies its community with its cause; the going
forth, its distinction from it {a/ia yap Biaxpiaei TrpooSoi;); the
return, its innate endeavour after its own good, from which
its particular being is.) Of the things multiplied in progressive
production, the first are more perfect than the second, these
than the next, and so forth for the " progressions " from cause
cause,
first.
perfect last.
that have received from their cause only being {to etvai);*
next, those that have received
'
Stoix- 6coX. 33
rav to
trpoiov
drd nvos
koI iiriaTpi^ov,
kvkXikV
^ tV
yap
"
iKelvtfS
Tdvra, Kal
Stojx- 6f 0^- 35
jrpis iKilvqv.
ttoi'
to alriarbv xal
pi^vei iv
t ainov
alrlg,,
168
and
but
perfect;
[CH.
not self-sufficing.
After some propositions on the everlasting or imperishable
{atBiov) and the eternal (alwviov), and on eternity and time,
not specially distinctive of his system, Proclus goes on to a
characteristic doctrine of his
activity
which
higher cause
is
also the
One extends
intelligible
That which
is
first in
for the things that are second in order are themselves produced
by the first, and derive their whole essence and causal efficacy
from them. Thus intellect is the cause of all that soul is the
cause of; and, where soul has ceased to en'ergise, the intellect
that produces
it still
continues
inanimate, in so far as
iavrd,
a^' ov yap
ii
it
its
i)
75
irpobSif aiarovxoi
iiriarpoipTi.
^
Stoix- 9eoX. 45
riXeiov,
'
/col
yA,p
yiveffii
W6s
3X]
intellect
Good
is
all
all is
intellect^.
that intellect
169
is
Further, the
privation^.
first, is
most simple,
because
it
is less
in quantity
Ztoix. GeoX. 57
Kal
is
no
Stoix- QeoX. 57
'
Srotx- OeoX. 62
iiwiov
{nroffTariKov mrKiiBiniTas.
yap
rij)
iol
ImKKov t6 iyy&repov rb Si
Iv v&ptuiv fjv
170
longer
life
there
being.
is still
is
[CH.
all
things, it proceeded
itself,
while
upon
itself.
it is
is
self-
knowledge that which knows and that which is known are one.
And what is true of the act is true also of the essence^. That
only the incorporeal has the power of thus turning back upon
itself was proved at an earlier stage.
Infinity in the sense in which it really exists, with Proclus
as with Plotinus, means infinite power or potency. That
which ever is, is infinite in potency; for if its power of being
(97 Kara to elvai hvvafu<s) were finite, its being would some
time faiP. That which ever becomes, has an infinite power of
becoming. For if the power is finite, it must cease in infinite
time; and, the power ceasing, the process must cease. The
real infinity of that which truly is, is neither of mviltitude nor
of magnitude, but of potency alone*. For self-subsisterit being
(to avdviroaTwrta'; ov) is indivisible and simple, and is in
potency infinite as having most the form of unity (evoeiBeffrarov); since the greatest causal power belongs to that which
is nearest the One. The infinite in magnitude or multitude,
.
Stoix. 6oX. 72
ii
ftiv
yap
alHov Trpo^\0.
'
Stoix- OeoX. 83
#X" TpSs
'
ZtOix- OeoX. S6
oflre (tori
wav ykp to
rb
/iiyeffos,
itrn, vSre
Kara rh
srX^ffos
IX]
171
on the other hand, is at once most divided and weakest. Indivisible power is infinite and undivided in the same relation
{Kara ravrov); the divided powers are in a manner finite
(ireTrepatr/iivai ttw?) by reason of their division. From this
sense of the finite, as limited power, is to be distinguished its
sense as determinate number, by which it comes nearest to
indivisible unity.
whole ^.
We have already met with the position that in a complete
causal series the first term is " imparticipable " (dfieBsKTov).
This means that in no way do the things it produces share it
among them. The cause, thus imparticipable or transcendent,
remains by itself in detachment from every succeeding stage.
In drawing out the consequences of this position, Proclus
introduces those intermediate terms which are held to be
characteristic of his system. Within the Being or Intellect of
the Plotinian Trinity, he constitutes the subordinate triad of
being, life and mind. To these discriminated stages he applies
his theory that causes descend in efficacy as they descend in
generality. The series of things in which mind is immanent
is preceded by imparticipable mind similarly life and being
precede the things that participate in them; but of these
being is before life, life before mind 2. In the order of depen;
life,
and
all
things have
life
Stoix- OeoX. 93
woWif /mWov
oidi
repcu
yap
al
tup
first,
then
life,
'''VS
ftx
io iiceivots diraplas
mreip^-
iyyvripa rerayiUvai
'
TWO
iiarji, 17
Se
ri
f<i},
fti)^ irpo
irdvTui'
t&v vov
iierexl>vTtai' ijyelTai 6
ToB vov.
'
dpJSeKTos voOs,
itoi
172.
[CH.
imperishable
is
being
is
to
life,
so
is
As
live^.
is
altogether in time
is
in every
is
in time,
is
in being
{ek TO
ov,
TO irpoamviov)*.
{aeipd),
and only
next above. Thus only the highest minds are directly attached
to a divine unity; only the most intellectual souls participate
in mind;
Above
all
divine unities
is
the One,
by degrees
TeXeK
of likeness.
irivra iv iraiTui
'J
Karh, toBto
'
yap
i;
The
evdSei;) or
'
oIkcIus Sc iv ixinTif.
As for example, iv
d\X4
fcuTiiciSs
iK&npoV
Cirapfti.
'
"
"
toCto.
Ti,
rpilintTTa
itoi
/ioptjriiv
?x'
''
""pi
IX]
god
is
life
and mind^ In
173
all
there
is
partici-
Much has been written upon the quegjion, what the henads
of Proclus really mean. Usually the doctrine
is treated as an
attempt to find a more definite place for polytheism than was
marked out in the system of Plotinus. This explanation,
however, is obviously inadequate, and there have not been
wanting attempts to find in it a more philosophical meaning.
it
seems
than the
which Plotinus had been conBefore being and mind are prowere through many points of origin;
intelligible world, in
duced, the
One
acts as
it
is
is
start
There
is
fiera to irpuTov
apASemoi
fle6s
ia-ri
iWrj
' A slight development on this line is to be met with in 151-8, but not
such as to affect the general aspect of the doctrine.
* Stoix- 6eoX. 120: iv deois ii irpdvoia Trpi!nu>s'...ri Si wpbvma ((is TOJlvo/ia
ifi^alvei) ivipyai,
Tip etyai
Spa
Beol Kal
t^ aya66T7jTes
etvai vdvTuiv
vav to
detov liirap^iv
fUv Ix"
t^ji'
wyaBln-qTa, Sivaiuv Si
f ai ^ iirdaTajis KaTa t6
ipi.(rTov
AW
tovto Si
ij
i)
Sirapits
ayaSdTris-
174
[CH.
After goodness come power and knowledge. The divine knowledge is above intellect; and the providential government of
By
be
nothing that comes after it can the
as
henads
knowable
expressed or known. Since, however, it is
from the things that participate in them, only the primal One
is entirely unknowable, as not being participated in^. The
divinity in itself either
divinity
knows
and
without time the things that are in time, and the things that
are not necessary with necessity,
are
sum, all things better than according to their own order. Its knowledge of the multiple and
of things subject to passion is unitary and without passivity.
On the other hand, that which is below has to receive the
impassible with passive affection, and the timeless under the
form of time 2.
The order of the divine henads is graduated; some being
in
universal,
the former
is
some more
particular.
'
'
Toirairrriv
"Siroix-.
QeoX. 129.
IX]
beings
is
175
henad in which
it
powers of the divinity penetrate even to the terresbeing excluded by n% limits of space from presence to all that is ready for participation''. Beside that providence of the gods which is outside and above the order over
which it is exercised, there is another, imitating it within the
trial regions,
order and exercised over the things that are at a lower stage
of remission
it
would mean
At each stage
of remission, the divinity is present, not only in the manner
peculiar to each causal order, but in the manner appropriate
to the particular stage. The progressions have the form of a
their complete disappearance into not-being.
circle;
return of
all
made
like the
its principle*.
The whole multitude of the divine henads is finite in number. It is indeed more definitely limited than any other
multitude, as being nearest to the One. Infinite multitude,
by
in
has
'
'
jroira
'
(riliiras
(TWOXVh ^'^
iralra dela
'''V^ '''O"
lie(r6niTi
producing
tAoi/s
els tjjx
^ Si iveipla Kara
Sivaiuv ixelvois
'
to 5^ Areipor
176
mundane
As
{virepKoff/iLoi).
soul
is
by
[pH.
soul are supra-
attached to
intellect,
and
back upon intelligible being; so the supramundane gods depend on the intelligential, as those again on the
intelligible gods". Somethihg also of visible bodies being from
the gods, there are also " mundane henads " (eyKotr/j-ioi evdSei;)^
These are mediated by mind and soul; which, according as
they are more separable from the world and its divided contents, have more resemblance to the imparticipable'.
Having dealt so far with the ontology of intellect, Proclus
goes on to formulate the characters of intellectual knowledge.
intellect turns
knows that
it
thinks;
and
it
Mind
in act
object*.
one subject. It
is
all
things
together.
its
it
being,
it
contains
all
Mind
'
constitutes
what
oix
is
after it
oiiru voepal,
us iv
by thinking; and
vtf 6^e<rTrjKv1ai,,
AW
lis
iiriffTpawrai,
oStu
(is
ovv
\jivx'>l
eU rh voajriv
twv voep&v ^l^xoyroi, xaSdieep Sr/
Si)
'
was voSs kot' ivipyaav oTSev, 8ti voet, xal oix 4XXou iiiv
AXXov Si to voeXv, Sti voei.
' Stoix- 6eoX. 170: iras mvs irivra o/io voel- dXX' 6 niir &ii4BKTOs djrXuis
irdvTa, TWV Si /ier' iKetvov kKairros Kofl' fv aravra. Cf. 180.
' Stoix- QeoX. 171
8n fiiv oBx iadinaros i vous, ^ irpis ^awAi' iTurrpoip^
St]\oI' twv ycLp awfidTuv obSiv wphs iavrh ivuTTpiipeTai.
tSiov tI voeiy,
'
wivTiav
'
?X"
""S' vovs,
oSru xal
to, aiaBtira.
"
votpws.
IX]
tion
is
in thinking,
participated in
and
177
thought in creating^. It
its
is first
which
order,
is
timeless, yet
The
intellectual forms in
each for
itself
If
stration, then,
more
contain
The
particular forms.
more
first
effects ; the
^ St-oix-
6coX. 174
is finite".
is
ij
ttSs voOs
vdrjaLS iv
ry
t^
voetv
i(j>laT7]ai,
ra
/iit'
airbv, koX
t)
Tolriais if
Troieiv.
Sroix- 6eoX. 175: oiSajwu y&p al rpdoSoi ylvovrai aiiiawt, dXXi Sia rHv
Kard re ras iiroordirets Kal ras rdv ivepn/ti&v TeX(iTr)Taj.
Stoix-
6"\. 176
(el p-ri
irias
<p9apTd, elSos
w.
^vxh
Kara
ttji'
((id) oii'
hv
t)
ol Se&repoi vbes
ii
SiexiKpiTO dei
ttjs yj/vxv^-
iTiiiapOpoval
yhri
XotTrwi/,
^x"
oWos
yoepby irpoiivipxov
i(j>iaTriKev cIStjtiktjs,
'
oifre
t4 ^Baprd,
12
jj
178
from
theitn,
has in
partial
Imparticipable
itself all
mind
is
[OH.
it
in a part^^.
first,
second, those that are not divine but that always participate
But the
soul
tions ; existent as
Hence
it is
Proclus
its
it is
comes under neither of these determitiain the act of turning back upon itself.
it is
indestructible
now goes on
and
incorruptible.
to define
characters
and
self-subsistent
is
in
is
the principle of
life
it.
It
to itself and to
that participates in
As
it.
it is
oXiKus
^WK
9eoX. 180
ev 4avT(},
dW 6 lih
rdv Sk
liepiituv
IxajTos us Iv
liipei
c!>s
to
ti4pri
ri 6\ov (x^i.
it
vivTo,
Cf. 170.
IX]
179
it
by images
(eUovi-
living ever
is,
that
is
to say,
is
imperishable'.
is perpetually moved, is
measured by circuits. For since things are determinate both in
multitude and in magnitude, transition cannot go on through
the tran-
They
must therefore go from the same to the same; the time of the
circuit furnishing the measure of the motion. Every mundane
sitions, of
that which
is
ever
term.
the measure, has circuits of its proper life, and restitutions to its former position*. While other souls have some
particular time for the measure of their circuit, the circuit of
time
4a'Tt
^
is
De An.
iii.
8,
431 b 21
tl/vxh
t4 on-a
Trcir
TdvTa.
Stoix. Qeo\. 196
el Se
toOto to ^j/vxoilievov
ad
iJ^rix'^i
in the descent
Kal i,iroKaTa(TTa(re<rai....r&(ra
122
180
the
soul
first
[CH.
time^.
With
One there
goes,
of
ticular soul
may
of causal
descend to birth
efficacy''-
infinite
Every par-
from birth to being. For it now follows after the divine and
now falls away; and such alternation must evidently be recurrent. The soul cannot be an infinite time among the gods,
and then the whole succeeding time among bodies; for that
which has no temporal beginning can never have an end, and
that which has no end necessarily has no beginning'.
Every particular soul, descending to birth, descends as a
whole. It does not partly remain above and partly descend.
For if part of the soul remains in the intelligible world, it must
either think ever without transition, or by a transitive process. But if without transition, then it thinks as pure intellect,
and not as a part of the soul; and so must be the soul immediately participating in mind, that is, the general soul. If
it thinks by a transitive process, then, out of that which is
always thinking and that which sometimes thinks one essence
is composed. But this also is impossible. Besides, it is absurd
that the highest part of the soul, being, as
it is if it
does not
descend, ever perfect, should not rule the other powers and
make them
also perfect.
Every particular
soul therefore
descends as a whole*.
3.
Of the
The End of
XelircToi
&pa
ivdSav re iK t?s
rwv ets yiveinv KaBbSiav, xal toBto diravarov ttvat Sia rhv iwapmi
Xpivov. iniani &pa tj/vxh /iepiKij Kariivai re ir iireipov Sivarai. xal iyUvai,. koX
rovTO oi nil waiireTai vepl iwiaas rb iriffrina ycvbiixvov.
* Ztoix- 6eoX. 211.
yei>iaeas nal
IX]
181
wrote^.
XvaeK
Kal
it is
already laid
it that can be
with Plotinus and Proclus,
this is more a recognition of the inadequacy of all forms of
thought to convey true knowledge of the principle which is the
source of thought, than a doctrine standing out by itself as the
last
word of
their philosophy.
seems to exhaust
how
Still,
human language
in the effort to
is.
make
Thus
plain
his doc-
itself
as
as a
symptom
may
be read in Gibbon
Justinian (527
Roman
law,
The fragments
appendix
in three volumes.
*
Enn.
V. 5, 6: t4 Se olov arinalvoi
ftc
^oix- Qeo\.
ri oix o^ov
'AiriXKava
oi
UvBayopiKol
ffu/i^oXi/ciSs irpos
123.
tSv
ttoXXSj'.
^ Cf. R. P. 545: Kal rl iripas iarai. toO \l>yov wMiv o-iy^s djuijxiii'ou Kal 6/iio\aylat roC uTiSkv yiviia-Keiv uv lajSi Bifus, iSwdruiv ovtuv els yvusiv IXdetv;
182
[CH,
now
every-
A leply to
Xpumavuv
of Proclus
was written by
c.
"
R. P. 647.
IX]
183
Empire
in its dechne.
them
pressing
special clause of
Simplicius,
Caelo and
to the
attainable.
when Aristotle
describes
it
as
Renan, Averroes
Zeller,
iii.
2, p. 846.
et
V Averroisme,
Cf.
pp. 92-3.
[CH. IX
184
pressed with such precision. For the rest, they are themselves
all
To the
Among these
own
age.
latest period, as
names of
Ammonius,
science;
its
it
afterwards diverged as it
" per incertam
To follow,
Joannea Philoponus
had Ammonius
Zeller,
'
for
iii.
(fl.
still
had received
commentator on
Aristotle,
as "the philosopher."
See
2, p. 829, n. 4.
of the
Commentaries
of Proolus;
CHAPTER X
THE INFLUENCE OF NEO-PLATONISM
The influence of Neo-Platonism on the official Christian philosophy of the succeeding period was mainly in the department
of psychology. Biblical psychology by itself did not of course
fix any determinate scientific view. Its literal interpretation
might seem, if anything, favourable to a kind of materialism
combined with supernaturalism, like that of Tertullian. Even
the Pauline conception of "spirit," regarded at once as an infusion of Deity and as the highest part of the human soul, lent
itself quite easily to a doctrine like that of the Stoics, which
identified the divine principle in the world with the corporeal
element most remote by its lightness and mobility from gross
matter. For a system, however, that was to claim on behalf
of
its
by human
by
and mind was evi-
full
reception
Church
in the scientific
form given
it
a materi-
Nemesius
(fl.
Platonism, transmitted
THE INFLUENCE
186
[CH.
service. The great positive result was to familiarise the European mind with the elements of certain metaphysical conceptions elaborated by the latest school of independent philosophy. When the time came for renewed independence, long
practice with abstractions had made it easier than it had ever
hitherto been difficult as it still was ^to set out in the pursuit of philosophic truth from a primarily subjective point of
view.
It
was
itself
new instruments by
provisionally
any continuous
intellectual
movement. In the
X]
OF NEO-PLATONISM
187
them
was of
in the West.
exercised
all
who attended
The
his lectures
ofiicially,
was to
fix
They
the "angelology" of
gave a powerful
impulse to Christian mysticism, and, through Scotus Erigena,
also
as soon as
thought once more awoke, began to trouble the faith.
When, about the middle of the ninth century, there emerges
the isolated figure of John Scotus Erigena, we may say, far as
we still are from anything that can be called sunrise, that
now
He
light appears,
THE INPLITENOE
188
[CH.
Platonists
ethical
Metaphysiics,
which
OF NEO-PLATONISM
X]
189
Taken over
Platonism.
directly or
when
allegorised,
origin of
Sometimes
it
God
as first prin-
To
the
Mohammedan
"theologian,"
et
I'AverroUme, ch.
ii.
THE INrLUBNCE
190
[CH.
custom of
who speculated
three religions
known
to the philosophers
all
held to the
polytheism.
investigated
it
vogue in a society
OF NEO-PLATONISM
X]
l9l
secular
revolt
is
and
revived natiu-aUstic pantheism. Ideas of "absorption," or impersonal immortality, genuinely Eastern in spirit,
may have
schoolmen, the Angelic Doctor furnished arguments acceptable to orthodoxy, marshalled in syllogistic array. For a short
time, his system could intellectually satisfy minds of the
highest power, skilled in all the learning of their age, if only
they were in feeling at one with the dominant faith.
Over and above its indirect influence through the psychology of the Fathers, Neo-Platonic thought found direct
admission into the orthodox no less than into the heterodox
The
THE INFLUENCE
192
[CH.
The Neo-Platonism
expected,
is
may
Some
of
translation of the
Series.
"
end
etemo Valor...
TJno manendo in s6 come davauti
1'
of Par. xxix.
OF NEO-PLATONISM
X]
193
own nature and not with the natur*of souP, Again, the
point of exact coincidence between Dante and Plotinus in
its
both
every soul
"there" knows the thought of every other without need of
speech. Plotinus, however, says explicitly that the individuahsed intelUgences within universal mind are together
alike,
What
Dante says
is
God is
still
At the same
primum
mind
is
whole universe^. Viewed in relation to the universe as disits cause, the angelic movers are in inverted
order, the outermost and not the innermost being now the
highest. Thus, by symbol, it is finally suggested that immaterial essence is beyond the distinction of the great and
the small in magnitude but even at the end, the symbolism
has not disappeared.
Like the completed theocratic organisation of society, the
tinguished from
its
intellectual justification
in
Cf.
fffv
oix
"" V
oiJtj) oiffia
dXV
Sti rSiy
Toioiriiiii
TOLas diaS^treui,
Che
la
mente
divina.
W.
13
THE INFLUENCE
194
[CHv
dogma. Soon
is to some
orthodoxy
whose
after came William of Ockham,
Subtle
and
of the
of
The
criticisms
the
extent ambiguous.
Invincible Doctor had for their effect to show the illusoriness
of the systematic harmony which their great predecessor
seemed to have given once for all to the structure composed
of dominant Catholic theology and subordinated Aristotelian
philosophy. Duns Scotus was indirectly influenced by NeoPlatonism, which came to him from the Jewish thinker Ibn
Gebirol, known to the schoolmen as Avicebron. This was the
source of his theory of a "first matter" which is a component
of intellectual as of corporeal substances. His view that the
"principle of individuation " is not matter but form, coincides
with that of Plotinus. Ockham was a thinker of a different
cast, representing, as against the Platonic Realism of Duns
Scotus, the most developed form of mediaeval Nominalism.
In their different ways, both developments contributed to
upset the balance of the Scholastic eirenicon between science
and faith. The rapidity with which the disintegration was
now going on may be judged from the fact that Ockham died
about 1349, that is, before the end of the half-century which
had seen the composition of the Divina Commedia.
The end of Scholasticism as a system appealing to the living
world is usually placed about the middle of the fifteenth century. From that time, it became first an obstruction in the
way of newer thought, and then a sectarian survival. The
six centuries of its effective life are those during which Greek
thought was wholly unknown in its sources to the West.
John Scotus Erigena was one of the very last who had some
knowledge of Greek before the study of it revived in the Italy
of Petrarch and Boccaccio. For the new positive beginning
of European culture, the classical revival, together with the
tive
power of reason
in relation to ecclesiastical
OF NEO-PIiATONISM
X]
19^
Enneads appeared in
was now set by its new adherents against
Aristotelianism, whether in the Scholastic form or as restored
by some who had begun to study it with the aid Of the Greek
instead of the Arabian commentaries. The name of Aristotle
became for a time to nearly all the innovators the synonym of
1492^. Platonism
intellectual oppression.
The
tians in their
dogma had no
Christians in a general
way;
life.
They were
it is
was
and
down through
so that there
Ficino tries to
make
first
it
appeared along
132
THE rNFLXTENCE
196
[OH,
When
cycles.
not in earthly
life,
vicissitude^.
This point
is
may have
tation
is
is
finally
souls
lest
importance of the religious redemption to which his philosophy leads, the theoretic aspect of his system is here misapprehended. Nothing, however, could bring out more clearly
than this pointed contrast, Bruno's own view. Coming near
the end of Renaissance Platonism, as Ficino comes near its
beginning, he marks the declared break with tradition and
the effort after a completely independent philosophy.
upon
terms.
modifications.
assertion that the soul, having onoe wholly ascended to the realm of being,
can never redesoend to birth. That any soul can remain perpetually lapsed is
OF NEO-PLATONISM
X]
lowest ^ Side
is
by
197
phenomenal
things.
One
of Bruno's
Plotinus
is
most
P or this he
may
have got the hint from the difference that had struck Plotinus
between the emotion that accompanies pursuit of knowledge
and beauty on the one hand, and mystical unification with the
good on the other. By this imification, however, Plotinus does
not mean moral virtue; so that when Bruno contrasts intellectual aspiration with a kind of stoical indifference to fortune,
and treats it as a "defect" in comparison, because there is in
the constantly baffled pursuit of absolute truth or beauty an
element of pain, he is not closely following Plotinus. Yet in
their account of the aspiration itself, the two thinkers agree.
The fluctuation and pain in the aesthetic or inteUectual life
are insisted on by both. In Bruno indeed the thought is
immensely expanded from the hint of Plotinus; the Eroici
Furori being a whole series of imaginative symbols interpreted
as expressive of the same ardour "to the unknown God of
unachieved desire," There is here manifest a difference of
temperament.
The most
striking difference
is
the stronger
THE INrLTJBNCE
198
[CH.
we saw,
itself, is
than
This,
subordinate.
as one of the
is less
prominent
With Bruno the reverse is the case. And Campanella too seizes
on the naturalistic side of the doctrine to confound the deAmong his philosophical poems
there is one in particular which conveys precisely the feeUng
of the book of Plotinus against the Gnostics.
spisers of the visible world.
away during the prevalence of the new "mechanical philosophy," to reappear later when the biological sciences were
making towards
accident that
who
biology.
it
translation.
The
'1
ciel la terra
1'
Le
Dunque
ci
6 senno e Dio.
may
r
OF NBO-PLATONISM
X]
199
vacuum,
"mechanical philosophy."
Now it
first
is
The Cambridge Platonists, as represented especiby Cudworth, did not, in their opposition to the naturalism
of Hobbes, show any reactionary spirit in pure science; but
were so much awake to the growing ideas of the time that,
even before the great impression made by Newton's work,
they were able to remedy for themselves the omission that had
universe."
ally
And More,
finity of
of both.
Platonists
THE INBliFENCB
200
[CH.
Having
still
if
ordinated
then,
still
more
specially, to the
The
new
time.
essential innovations of
were innovations in
suggest any new answer to questions about ultimate reality or
the destiny of the universe. It is not that such answers have
been lacking; but they have always remained, in one way or
another, new formulations of old ones. The hope cherished by
Bacon and Descartes that the moderns might at length cut
themselves loose from the past and, by an infallible method,
discover
all
Not only
The most
OF NEO-PLATONISM
X]
are expressed
201
aspects of
it.
If,
as
some modern
critics think,
solution
later
far as it
as real
it.
For
all
most decisive
THE INFLUENCE
202
to Berkeley's age
have seemed
[CH.
if
philosophy
itself
are
still
unexhausted.
There
is
make
were about
its schools or phases by historians is into "Dogmatism" (by which is meant the rationalistic theory of certitude) and its opposite "Empiricism,"
followed by "Scepticism" and then by "Criticism." As these
names show, it is concerned less with inquiry into the nature
of reality thaii with the question how reality is to be known, or
whether indeed knowledge of it is possible. And, with all its
differences, the modem "Enlightenment" has this resemblance
mediately preceded
it.
is always
which the controversy is tacitly referred.
This system is in effect the special type of theism which the
more rationalistic schoolmen undertook to prove as a pre-
in the background, to
Even
still
in its non-
of the Judaeo-
Christian tradition.
God
will.
to the world
is
OF NEO-PLATONISM
S]
203
ence which aroused so much lively feeling in his own age, had
of course a wider reach. Yet when Kant, stirred by the im-
ledge,
"Dogmatism," he
century, if
of things.
it
still
did nothing
In
its
else,
aims, whatever
may now
be thought of
its
now
beginning to be
known
in
kind
dogma in the
all this is
criticism of knowledge.
Among the
THE
204
INETiTJBNCE OF
NEO-PLATONISM
[CH.
But,
Up
philosophy may,
CHAPTER
XI
CONCLUSION
Once
left
in
shadow,
is
Mr Benn
it
through in
its
seems to show
it must be a
law, not only of Greek thought, but of the thought of mantest of psychological deduction is applied, this
that
it
kind.
that
For evidently,
as the objective
CONCLUSION
206
naturalistic phase
comes
first
and an
[CH.
idealistic
phase second.
may
be practically suppressed.
mind
of a people,
case of Greece,
may modify
which
law whatever.
When
new
tradition which
the past.
without respect to
its
order in
like
this uniformly.
Two
is,
of the Hindus)
philosophy of China
idealistic.
And
in
is
is
CONCLTTSION
XI]
207
the
dhism of course
Both are officially in the shade as compared with Confucianism and this, while agnostic with regard to metaphysics, is as
;
tendencies.
historical
law to
but that,
metaphysics.
Thus we
"
arrive at a kind of " law of three states
tradition
its last
we
to explain Comte's
CONCLUSION
208
[CH,
more general statement of principles. That is to say, his infill up the place that belongs properly to logic,
which in its formal division is subjective. Again, in his later
scheme, after the highest of the sciences, which he called
"morality" meaning really a psychology of the individual,
placed after and not before sociology ^there came his "subjective synthesis." This was an adumbration of metaphysics
tention was to
in the true sense of the term; so that his circle of the sciences,
completed
itself
by running
However
it
may
states,
idealism
'
Phileb. 58 o.
ed., p.
CONCLUSION
XI]
This, however,
is,
is
209
for
a thousand years.
What
it
much
bounded
by the national limitations of its philosophical schools. The
essential ideas, therefore, of the ontology of Plotiniis and
Proclus may still be worth examining in no merely antiquarian
shorter period of freedom, consists of isolated efforts,
spirit.
whether, after
all,
itself is
to try
The
may
Plotinus
do
little
make
de-
Since their
We
must allow, of course, for the defective science of anThe Neo-Platonists cannot be expected to hold any
other than the Ptolemaic astronomy. They do not, however,
tiquity.
much
in the
way of detail
is
w.
14
[OH
CONCLUSION
210
an empirical
cause.
fact,
its
Stoics;
is
periodically
ject.
Any
fire
general fashion.
same
hypothetically,
active.
Undeviating necessity, in
its visible
manifestation as
above man as to the unconscious nature below him. Change of manifestation depending on apparently arbitrary choice between opposites
belongs to man from his intermediate position. To attribute
this to the divinity is mythological. There must therefore
always be an ordered universe in which every form and grade
of being is represented. The phenomenal world, flowing from
intellectual being by a process that is necessary and as it were
natural, is without temporal beginning or end. These propositions we are already familiar with; and these are the
essence of the deduction. Thus if the universe whatever its
detailed constitution may be does not always as a whole
manifest a rational order, the metaphysical principle is fundamentally wrong. To prove scientifically that the world points
to an absolute temporal beginning, or that it is running down
in reality, belongs to the divinity
De
i.*).
CONCLUSION
XI]
211
to
may seem
it.
by Empedocles, according
most obvious interpretation of his words? So far as the
system is concerned, no doubt it does; but the solar
system
evidence points rather against this view. Astronomical observers find existent worlds in all stages. This suggests that,
to
stellar universe
would always
may
no
is
The apparent
is
in its parts.
the
mind
At no
of the uni-
cosmology in which
it issues,
by the
And
142
[CH.
CONCLUSION
212
empirical confirmation,
doctrine
is
it
if
this
possible facts.
down to a
To the
would refute
it.
addition, as
we have
seen,
in its results;
may
when
perfectly continuous
movement.
It
is
therefore of special
interest to see
at appear in
ledge.
Aristotle,
universe that of an
it is
may
be supposed to become
i7naTpo(f>'^, or
explicit.
The
its
components
and the
TrpooBot
is
supposed to
CONCLUSION
3EI]
213
founded.
Primarily,
it is
nature of the
seen in history
to its
is
tt/sooSo?, is
carried, as
is, it
If,
[CH.
CONCLtrSION
214
to have?
Evidently, to each
which
is
birthi.
Bruno drew
the inference that the universe must consist of actually innumerable worlds. If we take the Neo-Platonic doctrine, not
most generalised form in which, as soon as we go beyond a single world, it might seem to issue naturally in an
in its
made
by Proclus, the plurality of worlds certainly becomes more scientifically thinkable. For the "henads"
to
it
unity
mon
with
all
would have presented no difficulty. Indeed both the geometrical and the arithmetical infinite were
allowed by Plotinus in something very like this sense. The
difficulty was in the supposition that there are actually
existent things in space which are infinite in number. The
problem, of course, still remains as one of metaphysical
inference. For there can be no astronomical proof either that
the whole is finite or that it is infinite. An infinite real ethereal
space, with a finite universe of gravitating matter which
seems to be the tacit supposition of those who argue from the
as a subjective form
Bruno
to an end^
alike
and
sum
of worlds
is
running down
would
have rejected.
That the supreme unity, in distinction from the henads, has no central
body to correspond with it, would have removed, not created, a difficulty.
To Proclus, the representation of the transcendent idea of the good by a
particular physioil body in the universe was embarrassing (see Comm. in
Semp., ed. Kroll, i. 274-5; cf. in Tim. 170 E, ed. Diehl, ii. 102).
' He himself, however, regarded it as most plausible, if there are more
worlds than one, that they should be infinite in number; for a finite number
would seem accidental {Comm. in Tim. 133 c, ed. Diehl, i. 438). But clearly
this objection apphes also to his own henads.
^
CONCLUSION
XI]
215
itself
and space.
If
both
finally baffle
this,
(j>deo<;
d/i^oTepasv^,
idealism.
detail
we know, conceived
of
it
in the
manner of
local
and temporal
all its
features, would, if
contemning
it,
^
tell in its
favour.
APPENDIX
I,
APPENDIX
217
upon
tation" of
appeared
among
this
Competition
APPENDIX
218
itself
pression of originaUty.
it
to accident.
The Gnostics
APPENDIX
219
R. A. Lipsius in
Ersch and Gruber's Encyclopaedia, to which I referred as the
most accurate appreciation of Gnosticism known to me, represented an advance on the position of Matter, in his Histoire
Critique du Gnosticisme, that it was an amalgam of Christianity with Greek philosophy and miscellaneous theogonies.
Lipsius recognised that the gnosis was fundamentally Oriental,
and here he was right; but his presupposition that it was a
spontaneous development from Christian data was mistaken
and in tracing its non-Judaic and non-Christian elements to
Phoenician and Syro-Chaldaic polytheism, he took too limited
a view. The theory of its origins has since been revolutionised
by studies like those of R. Reitzenstein on the ancient
"mystery-religions" and the theosophic speculations that
arose from their intermixture. As books of epoch-making
importance, containing points of view that will necessitate
the re-writing of the whole history of Gnosticism, I must
mention especially Reitzenstein's Poimandres (1904) and Die
hellenistischen Mysterienreligionen (1910).
The real origins of the gnosis, he finds,
go back at least as
Empire. Of its various
elements, he himself lays most stress on compositions which
he attributes to Egyptian priests or prophets who wrote in
Greek but had command of a genuine basis of native theology.
Evidence for the existence of a varied literature of this kind
is found in what are called the "magical papyri," which have
come to light abundantly in recent years. Through its points
of contact with these, the "Hermetic" literature, so much
studied at the Renaissance, but since neglected as the product
of a late "syncretism," again acquires special importance.
In this, it now appears from comparative study, there is a
nucleus that had taken form probably in the first years of the
Christian era. It therefore derived at the start nothing from
Christianity. Of influence from Christianity or from NeoPlatonism at a later time there is very httle. Christianity, in
Reitzenstein's view, though it gave practically nothing, received much from the gnosis that sprang out of the mysteryreUgions; but Neo-Platonism stood out, as is seen especially
far as to the period of the first Persian
APPENDIX
220
in the treatise of Plotinus against the Gnostics, not distinctively against Christian positions incidentally touched, but
for methodical thought in opposition to the revelations of
were
different.
in
for
full,
"knowledge of God"
such objects
"demons."
The future
may have
historian of Gnosticism,
APPENDIX
221
being
marked
off
sophical sources.
APPENDIX
222
system^.
As regards philosophical terminology, one point remains
quite firmly established; the effect of the newer investigations
being only to show that that which was thought to be a distinctively Judaeo-Christian usage is more general, and belonged originally to the "heathen" gnosis. Siebeck, in his
Geschichte der Psychologie, has traced the modification in the
meaning of the word "spirit" {irvev/jLa) to the influx of
Hebrew religious conceptions; and, though this is too limited
a view, his genealogy of the later philosophical notion (patristic
and scholastic) is essentially unaffected by the limitation.
He found that in the Pauline language Trvev/ia is the term for
the higher part of the soul, and TrvevfiariKOLioT theillmninated.
The terms in this sense, we now know, were gnostic; and indeed Siebeck traced the usage in those historically known
Gnostics who claimed to be the successors of Paul. Our translation of the terms is "spirit" and "spiritual"; and this conveys their meaning, though with a metaphysical implication
brought in later than the gnostic period. For, in the tradition
of Greek science, jrvevfia was never a name for the higher part
of the soul. This was called not spirit but mind {vov<!), as in
Aristotle's psychology. Spirit, retaining its primary sense of
breath, was always a material principle. Sometimes, in terms
of a kind of materialism, it was identified with the soul {>^vxn)
sometimes it was conceived as a subtler fiery element between
gross matter and the pure soul but it was never applied distinctively to the soul's higher part or aspect^. An earlymodern
usage continuous with this, is when "animal spirits" were
conceived as the soul's instrument for moving the limbs. For
>
It
interpreted
"
APPENDIX
223
the Gnostics, the questions answered by the different philosophical views scarcely existed. Their thought was metaphysically vaguer, and did not concern itself with such distinctions of the schools. It was suflffcient for them that
"spirit" could be regarded as an emanation of deity, a kind
of influx that raised the soul above the level of a mere animating principle, and fitted it to become the recipient of a
religious revelation.
224
APPENDIX
APPENDIX
225
Foe the theory of knowledge, the views of the later NeoPlatonists on mathematics are still not without interest even
to students of Kant. An outhne of some of the positions taken
lamblichi de
Communi Mathematica
(Teubner.)
'
ex
w.
G. Friedlein, 1873.
(Teubner.)
15
APPENDIX
226
which
is
without assumptions
strates its
(di/u7ro^eTo?).
there
when
^ Z)e
Comm, Math.
rd
ii^'
'
aOrd
deiapet Kad6<rov
i/
SioXeitrtiti},
air^ ^6/ctra(.
dXX4
APPENDIX
227
Pythagoras began to
the systematically deductive character which
it assmned among the Greeks. In the order of genetic develop^
ment, men turn to knowledge for its own sake when the care
about necessary things has ceased to be pressing^.
The classification of the mathematical sciences given in the
two treatises is the same. First in order comes the " common
mathematical science" which sets forth the principles that
form a bond of union between arithmetic and geometry. The
special branches of mathematics are four: namely, arithmetic,
geometry, music, and spherics (o-^ajpt/eij)- Music is a derivative of arithmetic; containing the theory of complex relations
of numbers as distinguished from the nimibers themselves.
Spherics is similarly related to geometry; dealing with abstract
motion prior to the actual motion of bodies. To beginners it
is more difficult than astronomy, which finds aid in the observation of moving bodies; but as pure theory it is prior ^. Next
come the various branches of mixed mathematics, such as
mechanics, optics, astronomy, and generally the sciences that
employ instruments for weighing, measuring and observing.
These owe their less degree of precision and cogency to the
mixture of sense-perception with pure mathematical demonstration. Last in the theoretic order come simple data of perception brought together as connected experience (i/jLireipCa).
The ground of this order is to be found in the rationalistic
theory of knowledge common to the school. As Proclus remarks, the soul is not a tablet empty of words, but is ever
written on and writing on itself and moreover, he adds,
written on by pure intellect which is prior to it in the order
of being. Upon such a basis of psychology and consequent
theory of knowledge, he goes on to put the specific question
about geometrical demonstration and the activity of the soul
in its production. How can geometry enable us to rise above
impress on
it
'
fw^
*
Prologus
I.,
ir4(l>VKev d.Trb
With the
p. 29
Kal
yi,/)
toO dreXoOs
els
rb TActoy x^pe*^.
i]
iv airS <rTpe^otJL4vti
rijs
^ux?s
152
APPENDIX
228
matter to unextended thought, when it is occupied with extension, which is simply the result of the inability of matter
to receive immaterial ideas otherwise than as spread out and
apart from one another? And how can the Bidvoia, proceeding as it does by unextended notions, yet be the source of the
spatial constructions of geometry? The solution is that geometrical ideas, existing unextended in the Sidvoia, are projected upon the "matter" furnished by the <l)avTaaia. Hence
the plurality and difference in the figures with which geometrical science works. The idea of the circle as understood
(in the Sidvoia) is one as imagined (in the <f>avTaa ia) it is many
and it is some particular circle as imagined that geometry
must always use in its constructions. At the same time, it is
not the perceived circle (the circle in the al'o-^ijo-t?) that is the
object of pure geometry. This, with its unsteadiness and
inaccuracy, is the object only of applied geometry. The true
geometrician, while necessarily working by the aid of imagination, strives towards the unextended unity of the understanding with its immaterial notions. Hence the disciplinary
power of geometry as set forth by Plato ^. According to this
view, those are right who say that all geometrical propositions
are in a sense theorems, since they are concerned with that
which ever is and does not come into being; but those also
are right who say that all are in a sense problems, for, in the
way of theorems too, nothing can be discovered without a
going forth of the understanding to the "intelligible matter"
furnished by the imagination, and this process resembles
genetic production^. The division once made, however, the
theoretic character is seen not only to extend to all but to
;
predominate in
all.
liberty of dissenting
'Kiyeu'
oix iyyoovvres, S<ra xai 6 <pi\6ao<)>os Hop^ipios h> rots av/ifUKToiS yiypatpev
Kal oi irXeiffTOi
eliat
Tcajra rais
rb, iiroKel/icva
T^ yew/ierplf. avvfdeL yap oSk TaCro (iXXi}Xois, SlSti run yeufnerpiKwi' elSwv al phr
i) Sidvoia irpo^iWei t&s diroSeffeis, ^i" afirj irpovt/xiTT'/iKaaui, adra
S/tooTtt TO Siaipoifieva xal <rvvTi8ip,ei>a <rx/llMTa irepl riiv tpavrairlav Trpoip\ii(rat,
" Prologus n., pp. 77-79.
THE COMMENTARIES
OF PROCLUS
work
in detail un-
freedom
through its combination of formal deduction with subordination to the authority of tradition. In fact, it seems to him a
kind of scholastic theology, not indeed wholly anticipating
the spirit of the Western schoolmen, for it was still Greek, but
forming the appropriate transition from Greek antiquity to
the Middle Ages.
On the formal
side, this
authority was
its
principle
232
Plotinus'.
interest
much more
He is
also
may
and Plato as
most accomplished representatives, and assumes its completed scientific form in the Aristotelian syllogism. To recogcursive reasoning which goes back to Socrates
its
nise this
may
and of
mediaeval Scholasticism.
If too
means
much method
is
first
became
visible to
Athenian
Renaissance.
233
is
liberty.
It
by the exposition of
his
is
in fact
more
originality of detail in
erudition
made
till
'^.
by Marinus,
(1)
vols.
ed. E. Diehl.
3 vols.
Leipzig, 1908.
in SchoUa.]
234
The
for the
system of Plotinus,
We thus
Of course,
will
way
will
An
is
evil.
is
the
destruction, decay
it
is
mentaries.
*
De Malorum
Subsistentia, 233-234.
235
body or matter
of souls, for
it
hfe of intellect
is
some good*.
an improvement on Plotinus in formal statemuch better the essential optimism of his
doctrine; for his actual account of evils does not differ from
that of Proclus. Nor does his account of the origin of matter
This
is
clearly
ment, conveying
may
that
it
De Malorum
appetituB, sed
tales pati
'
male
many
non
"hoc erat
ipsis
malum
eligentes."
nuUatenus ponendum."
' Ibid. 254, 16-17: "boni enim gratia omne quod
se
malorum causam
fit, fit."
Cf.
Dc
Provi-
et
wpbeiao) oiv
apxwv, at
SvTav.
icaX
dii
fi
tSXri
xal ri iiroKcliievov
De Malorum
twv
of Plotinus,
SvJbsistentia,
of Plotinus as
236
as
it
were in
The many
its
own
right, calls it
tence of theirs.
Matter.
Of
all
it
was
For a
them the
however, we must
ideas of volitional
The many
are
never finally absorbed into the One; and therefore, on NeoPlatonic principles, there was never a time
On
this,
is
more
treatises;
common
which
life,
is its
own
is
mode
of being
and so far an
though souls may
a loss to
it
'
De Malorum Subaistentia,
De Malorum Subsistentia,
iii.
324-325.
237
evil consists in
they are necessary for the continued life of the universe and
do not affect the reality of any soul. Men, in the gaiety with
which they give their lives in battle, show that they have a
divination of this truth^. His solution
is
who
Here Proclus
this, if
is
not
but tries
on the existence of a providential order. All the questions
having been long debated, he had abundant speculative
theodicy behind him'. So serious is he about the detail that
he tries to determine what shadow of justice there may be in
the lot of the lower animals*. Their lot, he seems to say, is
partly in accordance with the qualities in them that resemble
solution,
on the subject
no peris that, where there is
manent individuality . Animal souls may perhaps be understood as differentiations of the general life of nature under
ideas of species only. If this is so, then animal life is to be
effect of his reasonings
not a rational
soul, there is
'
See above,
Compare
p. 80.
oh.
i.
p. 20.
" This becomes evident from a study of Origen's treatise Ilepi dpxwK (ed.
Koetschau, 1913). Origen adapts to Biblical stories exactly those presuppositions of Platonising theodicy which Proclus applies to the stories in
Homer.
Decern Duhitationibus, 118-125.
Proclus often returns to the question about animal souls; but he always
seems conscious of a final want of certainty in his own mind as to how far
*
De
'
individuality
is
to be carried
down
the scale.
238
itself i-
Considered apart,
it
by Boethius*, is
The causes which we
external are unknown to us in
down the
know only
as mechanical or
ages
Proclus.
In the
system of the whole, that which appears to us as mechanical
necessity really follows intellect. The way in which it follows
may be partly understqod by tracing the higher order of
intellectual causation through the order intermediate between that and mechanism, viz., the vitality of nature as an
internal principle'. Determination in the apparatus of the
mechanician is not primarily in an arrangement of wheels and
pulleys and so forth, but depends on an incorporeal pre-conception of the arrangement, working through mental imagination and a living organism*. Proclus treats it as a paradox
that a mechanical philosopher, who in his own investigations
makes especial use of pure intellect, should think this explicable as the result of sense inseparable from body^. His
tone towards Theodorus, to whom the treatise on Providence
was addressed, is, it may be noted, far more amicable than
their essence: hence the appearance of blind fate.
He
recognises
'
De
Ibid.
Providentia
et
194, 34r-38:
Fato, 155.
"Nequeenim tua
fixio,
Ibid. 178.
239
We know
causes.
mind and
known
intellectual
soul
and
from within as of an
in-
it
For Proclus
this implies
is
is
manifested
intelligible
Thus
it
of cosmic justice.
To
solve the
of possessions for
immortalius et sanotius."
Ibid. 117-118.
240
are apparently
for the
good
ance follow that is necessary for remedy. All souls are at some
time curable. It would be inconsistent with the order of the
universe that any being, among men or even demons, should
be always eviP-
The ruthlessness
is
of the processes
it
did not
of inanimate things for the purposes for which they are fitted'.
little treatises.
them some
gain for
from these
and
so, in
ordered,
is
down
deification of
'
Fortune
is
De Decern Duhitationibua,
Hence the
philosophically justified.
113, 18-21. Cf.
De Mahrum
Subsistentia, 263,
7-11.
^
De Malorum
(t6
44, 8-13 :
ykp
/iii
Subsistentia, 214-21S.
S^
ns
tV rixv
ra/miv d\A7iffT0K
aMav
(pTIIioii TTJs
olKelas iwuiTaiTias,
i]yel<r8<tj
xai ibpuTTOV
What most
241
in varied references'-
Among
truth
is
This
called Apollo'.
is
fill
a con-
In general, where
find the
Cf.
55,
21-22
in Bemp.
i.
ttjv
80-81.
rat ii'epyelas,
'
ilia-irep
w.
dij)'
xopvy"' 'AiriXXwy
(coXefroi.
16
242
what
it
What
is
is a system of metaphysics
running out at intervals into these fancies.
its
must begin
Of
this small
it
the
103
A-U6 A.
292-293.
296.
known without
first
243
kinds of knowledge^.
All,
says Proclus,
is
method
much, it
is
man has
allowed,
is
by
to be tested
is
its
Parmenides.
To "behef"
Trto-rt? aXri6ri<!
distinctively
The order
is
poem
in the
of
it
Love
is
In
its
(Trt'crTt?
e/oto?)*-
by which
sense of benevolence,
it
has
and
its
Some descend
birth.
Alcibiades tend to
Socrates
blades
is
is
assigned*.
Again, Socrates
is
is
prudence, as there
Of. 394,
1619:
jrffls
ry
(picei
yvtSiaewy
309, 8-14.
312-313.
308, 9.
'
i-T
airris.
162
244
that have had to descend into the perturbations of hfe to become the agents of this care'.
Proclus turns to a more generalised discussion of the
The daemon or genius in each of us is not the
daemonic.
though Plato {Timaeus, 90 a) may have appeared to say so^. The view of Plotinus also must be rejected, that
the daemon is the power next above that with which the sou}
energises in the present life*. In the view of Proclus as here
rational soul,
stated, it is the
individual
life
daemon
adumbrates
The innate
its
own
perfection".
'
372.
'
'
391.
'
417, 1:
/liv fieios
383, 26-31.
386-387.
'
422, 31-37.
'
iX^h' Kara
'
rliy
Beiov JVKwtoiov.
'S/i/ia
dreX^s
/coi
^6os
seen in Alcibiades,
is,
who aims
is
245
because
many
share in them^.
to Pericles, his
By
over freemen.
of passion
it is
433, 7-8
Kal 6
Sili
their
UXdruv
^uxuc
TipUav.
TO niv yap i/iipurra tuv iyaSwy aim rrX^loat, trapetvai Swarbv kbI
aird Sid t^c aWdiv KTrjaiv, to Se liepurrd ffiv i\aTTi!>iTein
TUP &X\av irapaylverai rots Ixowtf. The in^purra are of course those goods of
which it can be said "that to divide is not to take away."
439, 27-30 KaBUKov yap elireiy haarov twv ffaeSK dvipavrbv i<rn xal diierpov,
irdeos oKayov Kal dbpurrov.
"Kbyip pAi KpaToip-evov 6 ydp \byai vipas iarl, rb
*
439, 1-5
439-440.
446, 21-27:
iiriariiii.iii fj-iv
e.v
nt
rijs
iyae&v
Kal
'
71
Trjs
iyvuxiTov.
Sii
246
times 1.
Justice, Proclus finds,
injustice
is
is
whose business
is
specialised action.
The true
states-
man first tries to persuade the enemy, and only recurs to force
when persuasion has
failed.
Socrates, it
is
observed, makes
The
person's goods.
is
and
Justice
injustice,
differ
to circumstances.
474, 1228
ilTap^iv
Sirri)
t)
yv&ais,
TJ/i\i^v, ii
yap air^y
Tjiuv iariiaris
eCK'/iipafter
"
twv
elSiSv
i]
fxiv
Imoias xp*""' *
^T"
irpoiryoiiievos
'
KaS'
^| i'CSlov
elTrety,
otSa
yhp on rb
flip cI5os
T<pSe Tif XP^'Vi '^ '^ '^^"s '^5 StKaioaivris iv &\\if, xai oBrus
i(t>'
i/jLadov iv
iKiarov
rSiy
of feeling
'
500.
and
will
on opinion
is
*
recognised (650-651).
575-578.
247
577, 21-22: rb
'
501.
537, 21-28 :
"
irepl /iir
Akib.
Si XSyoi diA<j>opoi.
I.
112.
air\TJy Ix"!"-^
Karh
ipitTiv
538, 3-9: xal voadSes Kal iyuiviv K&v wpbocrd tls, ihs oi irepl rh niiiiiraTOv
yivofUriii TTis /SXd/STjs" SiKalov Si KaliSixov Kari, (piaiv dTex*/ieflo itivTcs, cis rrp)
oialav
/ii)
rjfiiSv
iv roirif
bv ivdpxovTes
vo/iltof/.ei'
ytveaSai, (rrepbiievai
twv
SiKalav.
248
ON THE PARMENIDES^
From
abstruse doctrine developed out of the Parmenides. The Commentary begins with a prayer to the gods for enlightenment.
This prose hymn, detached froin the context, has gained some
celebrity as a composition.
who
among
all his
The views of
different
commentators are
Some said the Dialogue was written merely for logical exercise,
and as an illustration of method. Others insisted that the
method was developed only for the sake of the theory of
reality. Again, some took this reality to be the Being of
Parmenides himself considered as One
{ev ov).
Others found
all
One
whom
Proclus follows,
who regarded
the
is,
He
airXus 8e6s.
645-647.
665.
249
considered in detail.
these,
reality 2.
symbolised
is
in external things
but
Proclus
exercise,
in passing
from images
'
660, 2630 :
roepas
oiHaf
vovv iyeijmiUvaii
'
664, 11-14:
Siipav,
.
ii
iniv
oSv 'Joivla
ttjs ^iffetas
d\\& Kal
Irria ai/i^oXov
^s ivoSSs
ian
'
^ Be 'IrdKla,
rijs
\j/vxiui.
lis
rr/s
ifaBrji rixoi
Tim. i. 197
DO need of fortune.
* 675-676 tSirrc cl fiT]
:
ye tS Tpay/jia \v<TiTe\4s * yi/maffiia ydp iffri t^s ei^vovs ^vxljs Kol iiri toic
elxSi/tav Ari ri irapaSely/uiTa /ierafialveiv Swapuhij! Ka'i rds &va\aylas rdi iravrafl/ui/
<pCKoii7riSn
260
The presence
in the
characteristic position
of Proclus
himself,
down
that the
the eldest and greatest. For minds of the first order make an
appeal reaching to all ranks of intelligence, while minds of
the second order can influence only intelligences less removed
from themselves*.
Parmenides, Zeno and Socrates in this dialogue correspond
to the iJiovrj, the wpoohoi and the iiriarpotjirj^. The dialectic
of Zeno, by which the thought of Parmenides is made more
explicit, is of the second order, proceeding by synthesis
through division and antithesis. That of Parmenides goes
directly to the unity which is its object - This is prior to
multiplicity and fundamental; yet a real multiplicity, as distinguished from spatial separation which is only phenomenal,
is not to be denied. In sorhe sense plurality as well as unity
690-691.
692, 24-28
iirel /col
Bktci/s
yv/wcurlav
deriov,
iirl
rets
nen
awdisen
AOTivaiKioi/ /col
I. 519,
/col
'
tAs
/col
dioi/i^creis /col
tAs dirXos
7^)1-
iv
air^
^ttijSoXcLs
What Parmenides
is,
251
One;
is
One name
applied
in
"monad."
a
signifies
A monad
minimum
in its
modern
sense, as fixed
by
Leibniz,
or potentially the order of the universe. In NeoPlatonism this idea is not absent, but it is expressed by the
term "microcosm." The monad or unit is not the atomic
plicitly
urgus
till
at length the
or^ind
of the universe,
is
reached. It
is
how-
possible,
.led to
see, was
Cf. 620,
6-8: S
ciaroixor ^outJ
fn-iv
jrXrjSos,
Kal airi)
/car'
alrlap tA t\tj6os.
yap xal
hi
rpwqKoiciii.
Cf. 764,
'
i).bvov oiaiiSSis
4<rTip 6 Sr/ntovpybs
iariv,
dXKa Kal
fiovdduv roWQii
iirkp
oMav,
7repiX7)7rTi/ti)
Selav.
This phrase was taken up by Bruno, in whom perhaps the transition first
appears to the later sense of "monad."
* 735, 10-11.
' Cf. in Tim. ii. 222, 5-13. The monad in relation to which the other parts
of the soul are ordered is not to be considered as the minimum of quantity
and the basis of numeration, but as the first principle of the soul's essence
Cf. in
of its powers.
Tim.
iii.
tAs iMviSas
els
tovs dptS/iois.
'
252
and,
if
soul,
we may
call
time^.
life in
But
its
prior to individuals
certain intellectually
secondary.
is
embodied
in matter^.
whole) but
;
not really the same soul disguised by differences of perceptible appearance. These differences have indeed an inferior
degree of reality in contrast with the unity of the person; but
the differing individuality
them.
This
is
is
is
More
739-742.
ia
said
on
Aen.
vi.
253
and so, the cause of the appearances being gone as reality, nothing remains ^ Yet, he allows,
the identification of opposites is a way of indicating the unity
which
in
all
each exists as
it
First there
may
the starting
that the
is
it is
first is
to assert an accepted
it,
to reaffirm
is
it
his
essentially that
other hand,
(as
1
751, 15-25.
'
788, 2728: oi
TrotrfTiKbv,
"
751-763.
/jidvop
'
iarai rtXiKov
760.
iKeivo
755.
757-758.
/cat
254
indeed
mediate stages to
this
is
brijig into
is
generals to particulars,
plicable
Side
by
we must not
fail
to notice
order of realities
for
is
At
first
sight contradictory to
is
said about
a passage
What
Proclus
is
'
824. Cf.
* I
Enn.
find that in
ttoitjtijs ?(rrat
trdvTUv.
/col
alriiircpa
v. 7.
my own
common
255
on
seasonal
causes*.
He
w;ould be immortal.
is
it
is
to be
it is
is
eternally active*.
For animal
souls,
below some
never exactly defined stage, the permanence (as has been said
before) appears to be conceived as belonging to the species
rather than to the individual^.
to bring out
be {Eth. V. Prop. 22). The phrases of Plotinus that suggest a similar infinity
iraa-a yiip iv
of concepts are these: riiv Be iv rf vcrnrv oi.irei.plav oi dei SeSiivai.
wv rXrjSos ix fuas yedfiepet (Bnn. v. 7, 1); ap' oSv xal iirl tQv SKKoiv ^4av, i<l>
Kal toU Xiyois
viaeas, roaoirovs Toiis \6yo\ii; fj oi ^o^-ririov t4 h rots airipiiairi.
aireipov,
^ux^s ra irdvTa
825.
Cf. in
Tim. iii. 72, 20: oXXos /xiy o <j>aiv6iievos SuKpdnis, S\\os Se o i\rietv6s.
a. in Tim. ii. 143-145.
irdXu' dvlaaiv, oix Saat
Cf in Tim. i. 53, 20-23 oi yip KaTcKSovaai tpuxal
:
TTjK
oiai 4^
{nrbnTaaui ii dpxns elxov iv ry yeviaa Kal Tepl Tijv SKriv,
elffiv
a!
voWal
tQv d\iyuv. This particular passage denies true individuality of most, but
not of
all,
irrational animals.
256
he
is
This
is
its
more adapted to
About the particular,
is
smallest details,
it is
not uncaused^.
not having
its
causation
its
above
wholly in the Ideas. For
not
end
till
unand
does
intellect, from the One and Good,
thus
constitute
only
a
formed Matter is reached. The Ideas
portion of the causal series. Evils, for example, arise through
causality, in his view, begins
Coming to
Socrates.
what
is
fail
if
there
is
realities
correspond-
to be knowledge'. His
own
ijfuv deupTJaai
duvardv.
AyaSov,
yip iSivaTov
8-12: Kalyhp
ttjs
tj
xu/>ii
ayroia KaKiv,...waTe
TriiXiv
838, 9-11.
858.
'
829-831.
t6 irapiSeiyiia o6 kokou,
&W
257
beyond these, he could himself use them with the utmost freedom and variety. His mode of turning on them reveals his
full
souP Proclus
'
'
Swd-
rap elSwp
ttiv
* 893, 17-19
oOtc yhp [to yiyviarKoy} irap' airiSv twv aMriruii Xa/ipdvei to
KMvbv. Cf. 894, 24: iraaa inrbSa^n ix t2v irpoTipuv. Again, 896, 31-33-: IvdoSev
:
&pa Kal
dirb ttjs oifflas ijfiwjf al irpo^o'Kal yLyvovTOi tCcv elduvj Kal oiiK d/irb
alff6riTi2y,
930, 24-25.
931, 17-18:
w.
^(Uets Si
on
twv
17
258
Kantian
his
knows
all
eKaa-Toi
Xeyov TO
with
its
thought.
In his
he regards as the all-inclusive doctrine of Plato ^ from Arisand Stoicism on the other. Each
its
is
processes
by
in the universe
Mind; but
creative*.
The things
their aspiration to
aspire'.
Its thinking
is
also
theism of Aristotle "dark with excessive bright*." The refutation of this exclusiveness is put in the form of the questions
How can the physical universe strive after the divine if it
has not its origin thence"? How can we know the object of
1
957-958.
'
842, 2628 : tois /ih oSv rbv vovv reKiKhv aXriov iroiovair,
"
921, 10-13.
dXV
oi)(i
xoi drjui-
844, 1-2 :
"
(is voel,
yt),fi
woiet, Kai
is Toiei,
/I'i)
yevbuevos 4KeWei>;
259
we
neither have our existence from it nor parlaws that express its true reality^? The Ideas,
Proclus, thus represent the intellectusS diversity by which
aspiration if
ticipate in the
for
is
mediated to
its
parts
for it
is
the
The philosophic impulse, says Proclus, is called by Parmenides "divine" as looking beyond visible things to incorporeal being,
ful,
and "beautiful"
later
deemed,
life
has in
common
with the
life
way
and
is
is
away from a
direct attack
on
and when discipline can be applied so that the proby orderly stages.
Proclus himself gives one or two illustrations of the kind
of search commended. Starting from the Sophist, he sets
forth a theory of relative not-being. Of this there are various
kinds. Matter, as we know, is a kind of not-being because it
of time,
cedure shall be
Xifytiiv
fi-fire
990, 7-11
oBffoi' aKriBaiTiv
xapd /jiiv
988.
awriplav twv
rpvxoiv, ef
uv
(jiavepbii
Sti rairdv
ian
Kvptdrara Si
-ry ffeiapTiTiKy
Tuv tvTiav Kal KpvnK^ t^s iXriBelas Swdfieu Cf. 1024, 33-38.
990, 13-14.
' 984-985.
989-991.
Cf. 987, 18-21.
172
260
is
phenomenally
are, but
cause of all
is
would be
we
easier to begin
the soul
itself*.
While commending slow, methodical approaches to philosophical questions, Proclus finds it to be a merit in the Parmenides that the relation of dialectic to the things themselves
"
999, 36-39.
1006, 29-35 :
oiK
i,ir'
airrii
999-1000: rb
'
(toi
rjfiSii
/iiv 6v,
ov oiUwirre iTroBeriov
iW
Airb
hi>
pqov
XA70
70/
261
into its
attainable
life
beyond
effort^.
This
the
was indeed the most important for Neo-Platonism; comno predicates are applicable to
know that it is knowable to itself*. Thus it is properly nameless. Yet it undoubtedly is*. The meaning of the negations is
that, since it is the cause of all, it is not distinctively any of the
things that
it
On
prodiices.
causes the negations applied to it^; for it is above all determinate being, as matter, or bare possibility, is below all determinate being. Its positive reality is apprehended by the unity
Titans, the " Titanic "
1025, 32-34 :
'
/idnri
Si
ij
/card rovv
972, 9-11.
'
1 108,
8Xws
Kttt
T]fuv
25-29
/tai
aix
iiiuv /iiv
ei
yip ianv
ayvuffTOVf oiSe airb tovto yiyvtbtrKOfiev 6ti iavTi^ yvtaarSf tanv, d\X&
TOVTQ &yVOOUfJIV,
S-qitov
"
iJ-e
xp^ <rwT6iias
i.irotj>i<rKerai.
Tuv SKuv, oCtu koX Aro^iireis aWlai tup Kara^iffe^ elaw. We are reof Spinoza's saying that determination is negation: see Ep. 50 (ed.
Bruder), where also he saya that to speak of God eTen as one is to apply a
term that is not properly appUoable. The sentence in which this is put would
have been accepted by a Neo-Platonist as correct if we are to speak with the
idTi
minded
utmost rigour. " Quoniam vero Dei existentia ipsius sit essentia, deque eius
non possimus formare ideam, certum est, eum, qui
Deum unum vel unicum nuncupat, nullam de Deo veram habere ideam, vel
essentia universalem
improprie de eo loqui."
262
summit of our
of existence at the
intellect,
a kind of bloonj
of the mind, dvdo'i rov vov'^. It is itself completely transcendent, " imparticipable " {a/iidcKTov, 'xapiarov, airo irdvTcov
^rjprjiJ,evov).
It
is
is
absolutely.
we
The
con-
is
it
it fixes
for them*.
beyond
anj'^thing in the
poem
which
is
it
the expUcit
Cf.
^
isn
tis Bebs,
See the interesting dissertation on the kinds of infinity and the kinds of
1117-1124. There is infinity in matter as itself formless; in body
without quality, as divisible without limit; in the qualities of bodies, admitting of continuous differences in intensity (tA hS,W6v re koX ^ttov, Phileb.
24 b); in the perpetual renewal of birth; in the rotatory movement of the
heaven; in the soul with its continuous transitions from thought to thought;
in time, limitless as to the numbers with which it measures the motions of the
soul; in intellect, ever present in the inteUigential life with no limit to its
duration; and in eternity (o voXvv/ivriTos aliiv), which is prior to intellect and
is the potency of all infinities. In the reverse direction, the notion of limit can
be applied at all stages short of formless matter; for aU in one aspect involve
measure and number. Eternity is the measure of mind, time of the soul; the
movement of the heaven takes place by the repetition of a measurable period;
the Ideas manifested in the succession of births are finite in number; body is
'
limit, pp.
finite in extension.
*
of Plato.
(is
oi)
nXdrui'os Bedfiavw, ^
(cai
263
some
is.
Plato, in the first hypothesis, proceeds by
denying all attributes to the One itself; only afterwards, in
the second hypothesis, where he combines Being with the
it is
in a sense "not-being,"
it
it
Different
definitely as exoteric.
God
is
it
begin-
ning, middle
things,
sible existence of
What
the
One
itself*.
may
1135, 2-5:
fievoiffTjs
'
then,
it
oiiK
ttjs
Uap/iepiSov (pAotroiplas,
dXV
iKdv-ijs
yaX'^i'Ti
Ht ioTw
ifuniixivri
voepa
i^-jiprtjrai
tA iv,
1079-1082.
1113-1116. The One
of it: n6vov di ri
fi>
is
it
can be said to
be.
264
own minds. This, of course, could not be said by Parmenides; and Plato himself could not yet say it in the subjective terms that would have appropriately conveyed his
thought. Even Plotinus has to help out theoretical insight
by mystical experience. The last degree of self-conscious
clearness was reached only by Proclus at the end of the long
in our
of thought or reality. It
is
the nature of
human
language,
ON THE TIMAEUS^
To justify the order in which I am taking the Commentaries,
the words of Proclus himself can
now be
cited.
The Timaeus
Parmenides^.
He
^..
made
2
'
itoi
t^v
iiirap^iv ito!
t6 ohv
t^v wpiir^v ipx^", Cf. 1047, 1 : rijv filav 4pxV ''^s yviiaeias.
17 A-^4 D.
i. 12-14.
Siris, 352.
i. 13, 14^17: ipBwi &pa <tn]iTlv 6 9os 'IdjU/SXtxos t^v SXijk toB nXtlTucos Beu-
ivdos, TovTo
plav iv
ebiai,
Toh Sio
265
a microcosm 1, knowledge of
is
man and
man
As God or the One can only be apprehended as the cause by the principle itself of the mind, so the
Being of which the universe is a manifestation can only be
understood by mind in its explicit activity. To place the
theory of thinking beside the theory of the object of thought
is declared to be a Pythagorean point of view 2. This meant
what we now call an idealistic position. The remark has
special relevance because the historical Timaeus was said to
have been a Pythagorean 'In accordance with that which had become the general presupposition of the commentators, the minutest details in the
necessarily correlated.
opening summary of
is
A point
When
^
i.
5,
Socrates
11-13: iMKpos
tells
the
KSff/los i
avSpuvos kuI
Cf.
i.
Io-ti
represent
202, 26-27.
22-23.
Proclus supposed the work ascribed to Timaeus Locrus,
' i. 5,
'
Kal
to be by Timaeus himself.
26, 8-10: TaBra ptiv oiv yv/ivaffla irpoTaviaBia
(piiTios,
' i.
ttjs
33, 24-25:
oiydp
irov /uKpbs
pih
Kdir/ios 6 &v$piiiTos,
XOffllOS,
i.
46.
'
i.
51, 6-8.
oixl Si lunphi
ij
ttiSXis
266
his City
not
itself
summit
many
and
interesting
said
science
fore
Milton, for
example, places the "thoughts more elevate'" of moral philosophy above song. In the celebrated passage in praise of
beauty, Marlowe, where he speaks of the poets' work, might
From
still
The
italicised
their
is
analogous to
An
error in the
Commentary
is
Dialogue
is
Aphrodisias
still
Once recognised,
right.
i. 62, 31
Koi lanv 7] ToiavTi] dSwa/ila Sma/iias wepiovffla,
This must'not be confounded with the Aristotelian view that providence
does not descend to particulars, but only to generals. The Neo-Platonists
held that it descends, but through grades, more and more lowered as they are
'
*
I.
Tamburlaine
the Great,
in practice.
Part
I.
Act
v. Sc. 2.
make
267
toteles, is
signifies, as
we have
With
power be-
passage in this
this it is in
priest.
"The
learning of
many things
(pvei),
do not
suifice to
1 i.
82, 19-21.
71, 10-11 : tA
Tuv
i.
produce knowledge^.
yip
riye/ioviKhv xal
and sense-perceptions
We
ourselves project
i]
Siva/Us
ftiffov iari.
'
i.
69, 24-26.
i.
102, 29-31
i.
102, 24^-25.
ws
productive of knowledge:
\j/vxi.i,
Prom a
6 'ApurT.OTi\ris, idivarov.
oil
ns Myos
rf
jTOiijTiKos etvai
tQh imariiimv
(i.
Select,
0IXe Ilp6K\e,
/i^i
Mvij/ias
inripxeiv ras
Kal
aiffffTJireis
268
is,
is
of the past from the stable orders, where these have kept
records, he remarks, contributes in the highest degree towards
perfecting
human wisdom^- In a
later passage',
he dwells on
Chal-
who
set themselves to
show how
individuals
may restore the memory of their former lives. For the differr
ent periods of a race may be compared to the different lives
^
i.
103, 1: ri
lii...etdos irpojSiXXoittey.
' i.
103, 8-9 :
"
i.
i.
Ti)v
viav Sriiuovpyiav
-qicei
ri^eus.
yo^irciiis
yiyvoiUvuv.
' i.
ripi iirb
ttjs itpawTopLiyTfS
Xovrai avvTiXeLav,
iii.
"fiSij
twv
125-126.
els <l>p6vriinv
Tapi-
269
was taken over by Comte from Pascal, viz., that the history of
Humanity may be compared to the life of one man continually
living and learning. The choice has been, so far as experience
yet shows, between Egyptian or Byzantine fixity on the one
side and movement through upheavals and submergences on
the other. Proclus gives a rationale of the theory, stated in
the Dialogue, of catastrophic destructions. Composite unities
position
it is
is
all
co-operate; usually,
what
glancing at his
depopulation
flood, as in
is said merely
Like Plato, he assumes in his general theory that
remnants are always left.
The wonder that Solon said he felt at the history {Tim.
23 d) is made the occasion of observing that in us wonder is
in passing.
the priest
is
Socrates^.
class
reality.
i.
oStus
^ i-
116-
' i.
122, 11-12:
On
this
i<t>
his
Seii'^s
AvSphs,
twv
i/j.e!s
i.
133, 7-8.
i.
152,,
1-3:
Kai Sivripav
ftc
?x<" M^'"'
ii^^hirpi
rd^iv.
indpilnruiv dtpavi^oiffris.
turc/S^iTTOTOi, ij/ieis Si
i.
ri
463).
270
them no share
caste, being
Europe.
A prayer to Athena, conceived in a generalised and sym^
bolical way^,
may have
the Acropolis*.
The
Titanic or Gigantic world-power, Proclus accepts as fact restored from actual records; but he assigns to
it also a cosmic
Athens represents the higher cause, hke the
Oljrmpian gods in the mjrth of the giant-war. The dominion
meaning.
it is
is
in accord-
is
including philosophic
wisdom
a whole
is
like strength.
At every point
is
its
end to be ultimately
is
i.
i.
154, 18-20,
i.
" i.
168-169.
valovs Kpareiv
'
'
'
In Souvenirs d'Enfance
et
de Jeunesse.
t^s Svvdneus
Timaevs, 27 B.
i. 209, 19-20
oiievbs yap
:
Sick ttjs
'
i.
i.
182-183.
S\i)s apcTTJs.
a^^o-rij/te
'
tA Scioc, d\Xo
ij
irSffic
ivaaiu
^f fo-ou vAp&rTi,
271
light,
Stoics
for reason
{So^a),
and
power of judgment?
Proclus.
What
then
Discursive reason
is its
common
{Xoyo^), answers
extreme may
apprehend from experiences of sense, it must, for proof, be
able to assign the grounds of its belief through an articulate
grasp
by
The mystical
state
i.
'
i.
242, 19-21
aXV
Tra/JEKeXeiiiroTO Sripav,
'
i.v
comparable to
a<popi<riiJ>s.
IXaSev
i/ot/9)
4ii<ri.v
fi/uv
Xenophanes,
rirvKrai,
is
interpreted as meaning:
is
some restatement
"The
universal criterion
is
commentary.
272
yond
it is
doctrine
is
common
theories
'
Kal
Cf.
i.
283,
^ux^s
(i.
472).
Stoics.
Enn.
"
i.
V. 8, 1.
265, 18-22 :
See above,
i.
333, 6-9.
p. 90.
t6v A/o
7roti)ffas
voepiv
THE COMMENTARIES OE PEOCLUS
have been described
273
by a distinction of Plotinus,
correctly,
as
that
is not merely
something external set in order, but pre-exists in a manner
in its ever-productive source'. What he desires to make clear
by these distinctions is the continuous intellectual necessity
that runs through the whole and the parts. He cannot, with
Aristotle, admit any element of the casual that there is no
it sets in
is
own
one system*.
"made." The
telligible
ideas
embodied
not made".
That the Good not properly an Idea, though so called'
beyond Intellect, means for Proclus ultimately that the
in nature are
is
^
i.
t6v fUv iv
tQ
voTjTff,
^ i.
'
^crrt
y&p
toO iravrds.
'
As
it is
i.
ra Kad* ^KOffra
i.
ISetJiv
Si(apitr/j.4ybJS,
dXX* at
(as distinguished
rijs (jyiaem,
iir
oiyl koI
to,
airois Kotv&TTjres.
ISeQv) oix
fdTi Stiniovpyb!.
vortrbv,
but
i.
itpb TrivTiav
W.
18
274
world
is
Good,
it
however, as
many do
a name^."
Causation,
The causal series beOne and Good, and descends to Matter imformed
by the Ideas. Since the One before Being, with a certain coexistent infinity that precedes the One as Being, is its cause.
Matter is in a sense both good and infinite'. Only by abstracand
tion
of
most beauti-
ful, is
order.
When
'
i.
the Demiurgus
fihi
is
dpx
jrpoffij-
y6pev(Te.
2
'
ttj!
evbs ovTos, el de /Soi^Xei, xal d?r6 toO ivbs 6vtos Kaddaov iffrl dvvdfiei 6v,
iryadbv
*
wg fan
Stb Kal
xal aveipov.
On
Zeller,
390-391.
i.
'
Tim. 30 a: eiim
i.
i.
391-396.
ii.
207, 19-22.
'
i.
394, 25-31.
275
The mindless
idea," which
less
is impossible^'. Thus, while there are parwithout a soul of their own, and particular
souls that are irrational, there is no part of the world which,
as a part of the whole, is not animated, and no soul that does
not, as part of the whole of soul, participate in intellect'. By
ticular bodies
participating in
world
is
is one
ground that the unity of divinity has its necessary manifestation in unity of system. Some, it appears,
argued that there may be many worlds formed according to
the one pattern of a world, as there are many men formed
according to the Idea of Man, o avToav6paiiro<:'- The reply of
Proclus amounts to this that man is at a greater remove from
the archetype than the system to which he belongs, and so is
more pluralised. In the ascent from the pluralised forms, if
there is to be continuity, we must at last reach an all-inclusive
whole, most resembling the pattern as absolutely one. We
infinite
world, on the
i.
399, 18-20 :
KeKptfiivi] TiSv
^
i.
i.
Iitti
yap
o \oyia/i,is
tQv
xal ^ Sia-
Tpay/juiTUv alria.
399-401.
'
i.
407.
The question, how the world as a whole is not made inferior to the
parts of itself by the addition of worse parts, is answered by an
409.
superior
anticipation of
Mr G.
el
yap rb
p-iv
o\if KpetTTOV, t4 Se X"P'"'> "''''' ''* ^'"' "^ KaTaSeiarepov toO iv aSirip
Kpeltrirovos TcpoirS'fiKri toO xelpovoi 7^yoi'e; XiieToi Sk t6 airopov, Siiri toO x^l-povos
i(jTW iv
i)
irpbs
Tijj
t4 KpuTTov trivra^ts Iv
Xois 5, TTiviKaSra
ij
irotei
to S\oy
/tal
(i.
424).
=
i.
436, 10-12.
i.
439, 22-25.
182
423-
276
This admitted, he
is
was one
the cosmology
science of later
finite world,
by
The
with
revolving
positions taken
by
ment
it
of the whole
is
same
relative order;
cyclical.
This
is
many open
The
questions as possible.
first
is
by relation
and earth he
to the
dis-
and
tangibility to the
phenomenal
world
known
is
to us
by
is
no necessary part of
former
To
primary, as the
is
elements, there
' i.
452, 12-15:
is
el
Of these the
first resistant*.
" ii. 6,
10 t6
:
'Kiyei.s,
ri Si oix i/iiauK.
ii.
11, 20:
ii.
oi)
fih
itiv ava<j>ii,
Tb 5c aTTbv.
'
ii..
Vp&TOV
i]
yij Kal
TpuTOv
Here
it is
277
interesting to notice
the
by Aristotle as the
Where he differs is in re-
fire in
all his
antiquated
in
The
is
sciences
ii.
" ii.
18.
26, 24-31
iv iKelvif
ir
ima
alffSriris K6<riws
/ii/iefrai yi,p
irivra
?x" koto
'
ii.
Kai
ij
dW oIkcLus
ir&ffas
iKpbrijTh
Cf.
ii.
49, 15:
^i-
'"'di'Tav al
elffi.
* With the qualification about differences of kind, stated above, the same
elements are universal for Proclus. See iii. 128, 18-19: iras tiiv b oipavbs iK
ii. 23, 25-30.
^ ii. 39, 18.
Tt&vToiv iarl Twv aTOiXciav.
'
ii.
278
us of Leibniz and
reminds
science,
Renaissance.
Of the highly speculative developments that follow, it maybe said that they are represented most in the most recent
thought. Pampsychism is very distinctly stated in outline as
one result of the metaphysical doctrine. The world as a whole,
though it has no organs of special sense, has a kind of general
sensibility (olov avvaia-Orjo-Ky. This Proclus compares to the
"
common
sensibility our
own is
From
the total
common
derived'-
mundane
cause, with
On
god.
immortality Proclus
its
by nature
it is
dissoluble*.
apparent
The only
When the soul of the world is said to be "elder" as compared with the body, this does not refer to an order in time,
but in being*. Soul has metaphysically a higher degree of
'
ii.
83, 23.
ii.
85, 1921
ii.
fUvTjv
Tifi
* ii.
xitr/ios
riiuv
Ix"
ii.
'
ii.
85,
29-31
SXKo
'
ii.
fi
Si'
oi)
itrTiv
tQv iroKKdv
Bebs,
\j/\ixl)v, ij
Si ^pvxv
dXXo vpiirus
Bebs.
Sii,
Cf.
i.
yoSv,...vovs Si Sia rb
363, 20-23.
ii.
55-56.
capaiv...oiKin Si rb if
6 /liv
279
per-
petually coexistent.
its
primal thing,
energies.
The
limit
its infinity
more
is
limit
infinity*.
What
it is
to
This belongs to the subtle theory of time and its kinds, expounded later.
ii. 123-124.
120.
ii. 138.
Of. ii. 152, 11-14: airi rb aw/ia oiK Icri nepurrbv els jroWi, dXX'
2 ii.
'
ds
direipa,
t)
Si
^vxv
\axovffa awfiAruv
'
ii.
dirXSs
ii.
wiaji
'
iir'
^x"
'^^^
"^^
rjPiSffdatj
x^P^'^'^W
els 8/ioia
is
(ii.
204, 17-19).
141, 25-27: oSre yb.p irav vipas taov vavrl ir4paTi,...oiSk iraffa iveipia
iTreiptg. tail.
ii.
iroKXd.s oiaias
dweipov. Cf.
Ian.
'
StrjfjTjfi^vrj els
biriiffTcunv.
147-164.
280
to the soul in
it.
own
its
It does not
has from
its
As Proclus explains
nature^.
elsewhere,
own nature
causes
its
it
it is
into
own.
The principles enumerated as constitutive of soul are, in a
very generalised statement, (1) totality, (2) unity and duahty 2,
(3) division and harmony, (4) connecting bond, (5) multiplicity with simplicity. Here it becomes especially difficult to
do justice to the subtlety of the thinking. The insight of
Proclus into the subject-matter was beyond the tradition
behind him for a part of this was the search for mathematical
and musical analogies to the mental life. He knows, and
occasionally says, that the formulae of which he gives an
elaborate statement do not touch the nature of the soul'.
Plato's use of mathematical terms he compares to the use of
mythology by the speculative theologians and of symbols
by the Pythagoreans*. It is not a mode of discovering the
truth about mind and soul, but only of setting it forth or
wrapping it up in external figurations^.
a dispersion that
is
not
its
ii.
eU rd
'
elvai S
The
is SuoftSijs
in so far as it has
ii.
oiffla
*
T^s
ii.
174.
iJi,r]Siv
Cf.
ii.
it
is
before
(ii.
242, 17-19).
ian
Kal
\byav
i)
\l/vxvS'
246, 47 :
5^ ye IlXdrwy 5l
iXK'
two kinds
it,
ficpiar'^,
Seofn^vi] croifidray
ian,
soul
of nature
ttjj
247-248.
piv BeoXbyoi
is
concerned, as he
tells us,
281
He
he does his best to show how these are imaged in mathematical relations 2. Primarily, he always refers to the world-
soul,
it is
it,
this
,
is
body and
how
souj in general.
know it
it
as a part of its
own
existence.
but to
and not in
to be
itself
ii.
place, this
means that
it
all things'.
riiv
yvwaiv vvv
ttjs \pvxni,
iirutKo-
voi/xeBa.
^
Cf.
ii.
4>vi)S...aTrb rflx
elxivuv
iirl T&.
laru th
vapaSelyfrnra
oiffijf avp.-
dvairefiirdiJievos.
311, 16-20.
263, 7-9 : ri /ih yap oStu) rairbv, s iv rg TavrhniTi. -rijv iTepbTi)Ta Kpvtftlm
wepiixei-v, KpeiTrdv ianv fj Kari, t^x liea-irriTa rT)V f ux'ti}".
ii. 102-103. Cf. i. 406-407.
6 Timaeus, 30 B, 34 B, 36 de.
=
'
ii.
ii.
ii.
282, 25-27
Koi
rav rb aoiiMTiKbv
toO
15-17
o/iolus
wavTaxiSev
ffii/iaros.
to,
rdvra ovaav.
t]
di
Cf.
\j/vxi)
ii.
tuTiKws
296,
14H8.
282
knowledge of the
soul*.
(vov<; Xoyt/co?)";
the
common form
form'.
Formed
cepts*.
(eTrt-
by
synthesis
principles.
I
ii.
301, 6-17.
'
ii.
ii.
ii.
299, 2232: 6
ianv
5'
<pairii>,
roD
oiiriiiSovs ttjs
^vxvs-
/iovoeiS'^s.
^
rd
ii.
I'oeii',
ii.
lis ipiireias
t]
^vx^, X670U Se
to ^ieiv.
301, 7.
315, 7-8:
'
ii.
'
See
ii.
283
it
as the
its
is
indivisibly*.
is
but
in
it is
movements
participate
it.
The "parts of time," nights and days and months and years,
Time before their manifestation";
but this does not mean that there was time before the world.
pre-exist in the reality of
iii.
'
iii.
23, 4
' iii.
'
iii.
Mvoiav
^j/CKiiv.
/ij]
iii.
27, 18-20.
Tr&peanv a xjibvou
Si'
xp^'ov Kal dreXi)! iart ttix ipodiv Kal xpiffEi toC reKetoripav
air^v woiiaovTOi Kal irpea^vripav -xpivov. (Contrast Aristotle, Phys. iv. 12,
ToC ivimedxravTos
221bl;ef.
13,
ofirf/K
222 b
19.)
'
28, 21.
iii-
32, 2-4.
36 6-9 al yb.p d^oi-eis roirtov aMai /jutnaSeU eliri irpi t&v ireirXridvcrnirpovrdpxovn tS>v koioviUvuiv
vat> Kal iir iwapov dvaKVK\oviiivaii, Kal i.Klvryroi.
ya>bii.evbv iari Trpb Tijs
Kal voepai irpb rav aUrBriTSiv. Cf. iii. 55, 5-7: Tav yoxjv rb
'"
iii.
284
The "before and after" and the world and time everlastmgly
coexist^. Their coexistence expresses itself in a total movement that may be figured as a circle or a spiraP because it
itself. Motion is not time, but temporal intervals
measures
of motions'.
are
Like a modern psychologist, Proclus notes the element of
negativity in " was " and " will be." Yet, though characterised
by "no longer" and "not yet," they also participate in being,
as is indicated by their grammatical derivation from the verb
to be*. The things that have their becoming in time are
inferior to time as regards being. The world of genesis becomes perpetually, but there is no birth or dissolution of time,
unless one should apply these names to its necessary relations
of periodic process and return^. In this sense, the heaven or
universe also might be said to be dissolved or bom; but this
can be rightly said only in a sense compatible with the assertion that for all time it is and was and will be.
Proclus expressly dissents from the apparent meaning of
Plato's teleology (Tim. 39 b), by denying that the light of the
sun came to be in order that we might have a measure of
time' The whole does not exist for the sake of the parts; and
the time that is as it were perceptible may be considered
rather as a last result of higher (that is, dominant and imperishable) causes, than as that for the sake of which they
exist. Time itself is a real measure prior to the notional
measure' in our minds. It is not, as many of the Peripatetics
have called it, "an accident of motion," for it is everywhere,
not only in moving things'- Proclus equally rejects, as we
have seen, the view of those who would limit it to the "inner
sense." External things also have part in it. It measures all
things, moving or at rest, by a certain permanent unit {fwva.<i)
ever repeats
iii.
'r/v'
KbiriJ-ov
yeviatai
tjv,
dXX' o/io Tip xbaiuf koX ToCra Kal i xP^""^ iii. 90, 16-17.
MU. 21, 2; 40, 29.
*
iii.
4546
TTjpii^erai
ro
Tov ovTOSj
17
Kalrot
kolI
rd
0^5'
&]/
iii.
50, 10-14.
iii.
83, 19: rb
rjv*
koX to
rb Sk Tt^
Kara trap^yKkiffiv
iii.
iiriv(niiJui,Ti.Kbv
^ffrot,
/Jt/qS^irUj
dff'
'
Kal eL r<^
dXX'
oCi'
ovti fioKKov
7^ TrdvTus
'
"
iii.
iii.
81, 23-25.
95, 15-16.
xapaf-
6.fi7jy4irri
airov Karuvofid^eTO,
51, 7-12.
nirpov.
fiij
yuer^x*'
285
ordinate periods
is
" the
life
of the whole'.
sceptical position
iii.
19, 2-9:
Kar'
&,pi8ijUiv,
iii.
"
iii.
92, 24-25.
Cf.
iii.
ivn xpi""!
rAeios ipiBpii
-nls
tov
TravTbs diroKaTaffTdtretas.
* iii.
25, 19-24: tI
Kal ipipuiTOv;
o6S'
aXXus dwipeda
T04S avTiKeipivois
'
iii.
S'
aW S/uas
55, 9-12
&v
elrj
^ttI
voririv
t^s
apa
koX yevriTov;
yl/vx^Krjs oiirlas
rijs petrdrriTos
S'
&v
air^s xPt""^^!"^^""
ofiros piv airb tuv oKiKWripav
etri
p,epi<TTOV S,p.a
rpdirov Tiv&
iir'
:
els
t4 pepiKJirepa
irpbeiaiv S.XP>-
Kal tCov iaxiriav olov ^(^av Kal ipvTwv, i}plv 5* aTri twv p.epiKwv piv, reraypivuv
Si pArpinv SXus ylyverai yvihpipos.
iii.
'
39.
Cf.
ii.
264, 19-21.
aW
at per t^s
ykp avrai rb eUbs (xovnv ai iiroBiaeu,
dirWrijTos a^ljTavToi tuv Belav, at Sk aa-irep ivb prixavv^ iToridevTai tttiv Klv-riru'
Tuv oipavlimi, eaKevwpripAvai. rapa tuk vearipav.
'
iii.
56, 28-31
oiSk
286
an
who miss
affair
of
is
as
much an article
The Earth, he
argues*,
avev
yjrvxr]!;''
Plato calls
it,
it is
"the
first
and
insist,
of earth,
exceeds the
iii.
96, 31-32:
Twv oKay
2
iii.
' iii.
airra
/caXfj /iiiv
are
148-149.
iii.
roU
146.
ipcXoBeAfioaiv els iirlaKe^iv irjmreivu Kai dpeyelpu 4v aiiTOts kcU t4s irepl
Toirav aKpi/Sctrr^pas
= iii.
147.
'
136,
iii.
ii
all
xaravo'^creis.
iu.
1.
Cf.
ii.
122, 16,
135-136.
occurs
' iii.
136, 26-28:
it^;
whence
its
287
it is
it is
lowest depth.
is
its
is
stationary at the
tude
it is first.
as Aristotle
had
said, insignificant in
whole.
is
when they
tell us,
is
full
Now
of divine
Plato
1
in
is
to rationahse
it
without irony.
What
is
meant by
all
things are
all.
'
*
^
el
Si
iii.
136-138.
ia-Hv, o6S4v
(coi
i<rTi.
twp
288
own god; but some who have chosen the mode of life assigned
do know it, and
to a certain divinity for example, Apollo
are therefore called children of gods in a special sense i. From
others, if
it, is
to find
historically, it
and so in the end the continuity that has insensibly become one of the presuppositions of modem science,
descends from the Neo-Platonic metaphysics.
of continuity,
iii.
159, 29-31
^iriyvtaffav 6e6tf
'
ctl
aXV
oi vSjrtu riv
iamQv
^la^ KaXovvrtu
iratSes
Bewii.
2 iii.
160, 23-24.
'
iii.
fjLetrdrijTas
*
iii.
fiXoJS
toCto
(coi
205, 26-27: avexifiolrqTOi yip eWiv ol y6es toO 6elov vov koI
ayivrjTOi,
irai'TeXiDs.
iii. 209, 18-21 : oi Se vAes oi tois \j/\rxaC^ AvuSev iripepriKdres oiiK kv \iyoivTO
Ipya ToS rrarpSs oiSe yap yiveaiv faxo", dXV ayeffiTus ^le^di'ijo-ax.
289
who
wills to preserve
structibility,
will, is
meaning
avvBea-fio<;),
re-
is
and
this is
element inherent in
lives within
it still
innermost nature. To
a cycle, there
is
all
the successive
with certain
oKoyov ^a>fj<;)'.
From
Trj<;
from the growing points of a plant, the irextended into the system of perceptions and
habits that subserves each embodiment'. This system disthese, as
rational hfe
1 iii.
''
iii.
is
PoiXijtriv
iii.
213, 12-18.
on
tjiBaprh fih
icm Ka$'
rrjv airrwv
(piitriv
&<p6apT6,
iiXTi.
216-217. * See above, p. 156, n. 4. ^ See above, p. 179. ' iii. 236, 32.
^uipi SXoyov
iii. 237, 18-24: oi Si rifUrepai \j/\rxaX...ix<>'""- ^M ^ ^V ix^f^aTtgiirati (is vpbs airds, irXeoydfowi Se T<f Kai dWrfy ICKoyov TpoaXan^&veiv, iKTaaiv
' iii.
'
oBo-oi'
w.
irpoo-ffijin?
t^s Sevripas
iffrl dyi/Toeiff^s.
19
290
corresponds to the myths of the choice of the soul, the punishments in Hades, and so forth. Thus, though the concrete
individuality in
much more
dissolved,
its fullness is
is left
of souls
by the
rank of souls that descend to birth instead of remainis the changing of life from thought
to action, the coming under external necessity, the association
with perishable things*. For the differences among particular
souls belong to them not from relations to particular bodies,
as some say, but from their own essence^.
inferior
The Demiurgus
'
is
by some, but
ately imperishable
is
alluded to as held
oi>
av/ji^Sfyriiris ij
rd
&\oyos, &\\i,
/lia fa<)
woXvaS^s
^
iii.
iii.
ij
bfiooifftov
rj
oOk
oT5' ottus
^vxV
^oT^Xovrai X^yeiv.
im
Beuplas. It
We
are told (iii. 265) that he put forward the remarkable thesis
that the vehicle of each particular soul is the universe (t^k toO iravrht
meant.
(piaw).
*
iii.
elfiapfUvrji)
'
iii.
etffi,
KaSdircp
ijuxitl
vo^aeus
^iri(ci}pois
iljrA
els irpSfo/,
to iiri
riiv
irpdypuuriv.
tuv
ToiSivSe
axiaeuv
al
291
nature of the whole and as teUing them the fated lawsK Discussing this, Proclus treats as characteristic of Fate the manifold connexion of causes ^ not exclusi-^ly natural in the sense
of mechanical', but, to the souls that come under it, appearing
to be externally imposed^ The natural causation in which it
consists
also not to
it,
soul
and
so,
this
is
when he goes on
as a
is
rational animal.
really a classifi-
is
transition directly
^
Timaeus, 41 e
^ iii.
if
272, 24-25
Tijv
rod
toSto 5k AiMpjiirr}^
tStov, 6
fd/wvs re
aris-
eipiiii,
ri
rdf ii,
treptoSLKT] iroiT]tris.
' iii.
272, 16-20.
* iii.
BiUVTai
TTJs eliiapiUviis
SixovTM Tois
riys
irpovolas
i^r/pTTiiiii'Oi'
el/iap/ihovs.
5 iii.
iii.
277, 18-20:
vovTai
iyK6iriuoi. yeySvcuriv al
S-vaeev diri
TTji elfiap/i4i'Tis
278, 25-27.
irb tou dvirrov elSovi rrit fu^s SoBXai ylyxp^rai yA.p airais (is dXiyots ri t&v.
iii.
(tpoTTj^eio-oi Si
192
292
tocracy to democracy*.
all
when Socrates
has to learn from Diotima how to find the way to the Idea of
the Beautiful, it would be absurd to say that no soul can
become incarnate at the highest stage as a woman*. Is there,
Proclus goes on to ask*, a difference of sex in souls prior to
birth?
He
is,
iii.
282.
2 iii.
240.
iii.
281.
'
iii.
283.
"
iii.
293.
iii.
in-
284.
and
the
life
Kori
tV
iii.
serpent
294, 29-295,
is
is
KpOvTetv cirovSdfoiTos.
293
For the body, says Proclus, the way to that which is conand the deprivation of life, produces painj
the way to that which is according to nature, and the attunement with life, pleasure'. These affections of pleasure and
pain he finds to be the sources of the other affections'. We
cannot help being reminded of Spinoza's definitions in the
third Part of the Ethics''. Unlike Spinoza, however, Proclus
regards the living body as characterised not primarily by its
conatus, but by perception, to which appetition is secondary".
The intellectualism (in modern phrase) of Proclus appears
when he says that the decrees of the Demiurge {Tim. 42 d)
trary to nature,
'Xiyonev.
* Cf.
iii.
299-300: T^s
KuBiirep tuv
^ iii.
T^s
S,pa
ffio/jATiav.
287, 17-20: tov yap (rib/mTos v /ih iirl rb trapb, ^iam iSbs Kal % aripiijis
T^v Xiirriv iwepydCerai, t} 5i iirl to Kara (pinv iirdvoSos Kal i) irpbs t^v
fdiTJs
SiJo
TOUT-a wdBrj
Koi. irrjyal
tuv dXXwi'
itaBuiv.
'
8 iii.
ad maiorem perfeotionem.
Tristitia est
294
are not
commands
but are
accordant with
cooperation of
is
mind and
is
not
The immortal
derivation.
body
till
soul
is
by the
nutritive
life
and the
life
as
is
if
one standing on
all sorts
of ways
by the
affected
him
in his reality.
So
it is
is
iii.
a&rwv
302, 29-31:
Avalnos J tQv
t"' offe
' iii.
304.
"
iii.
irapaylyverai,
fih
irpiSn-q
S'
* iii.
321, 31
' iii.
322, 21-23 :
tj Ai/ijtt)
irhiTU>s...S\iTipa Si
i)
i;
^jivxh
idivaros.
ffthpixLToi.
bSf
7rp6euriv iiri
irepl aiiTo
kotoSto.
separate existence.
' iii.
330.
295
action
goes before
is
and its powers and energies. Its essence indeed remains identical^; but its powers and energies are perturbable
throughout; so that it cannot be said that anything of them
dwells always in serenity amid the flux. In short, Proclus
agrees with Plotinus that the trouble is illusory; but he
asserts against him that the illusion may affect the whole
soul while it is here, and make it inwardly, not as in a mere
dramatic representation, unhappy'. The return to the
rational order of the soul is to be accomplished by unbinding
essence
ON THE REPUBLIC
A.S compared with the commentaries hitherto dealt with, the
Commentary on the Republic has the advantage of being at
once approximately complete and more manageable in size.
It does not, like the others, set out to go over the whole of the
Dialogue in detail, but consists of dissertations on selected
The
topics.
first
part
is
is
conjecture.
philosophy
if I
may
Not
a complete
may now
judge from
my own
iii.
iwaSis
^vXiTTovTas ir
iii.
334.
irpos
* iii-
ij
IlXurrivoi' Kal
Cf.
iii.
323.
airi) Sia/nivei.
3*6. Cf. in
Remp.
rbv lUyav
Oe6Sapov
Cf.
iii.
ii.
53.
296
fill
up
all
logy
is
giving
to
harmony
it for
liable to
is
beneficent.
must
consist of opposites.
Philosophy
is
Above
soul possessed of
it
strife is
/jlovo-iki]
the
life
and
of intellect.
ipwriKi].
The
is
a kind
of enthusiast 2.
first
part
i.
68-69. Cf.
"
i.
57.
Here
ii.
295-296.
THE COMMENTABIES
own mind
see
01"
PROCLUS
297
and allow
none the
less
Dialogues'.
Finally, he
Plato's attack
it
We
education.
have made
ture,
things,
118-119.
168-169. Cf.
i.
kot4 5e
tV xpe'a"
ii.
'"">'
See above,
p. 160.
* i.
202-205.
298
Why
external use of
him
They do
as
some
in
to miscellaneous opinions
third kind
is
i.
116.
'
i.
xore
tr^uddtnjs
(rvvipt],
/ijj
i,vaKKi\Brjiial
iSwinvs
rvxe!"
starting
Proclus applies
it
'
"
i.
' i.
178, 24:
/juirla au<t>poaiin)i
Sri rijv
i.
48.
Kpelrrav.
ix
rdv MovaSiv
{Kpurra/iivrjv iv
rah
AiroXais
ico
Phaedrua, 245 A.
i.
181.
i.
186-188.
299
they appear. In the first case it is the poetry of representation; in the second, of fancy i. All the Imids are illustrated in
Homer.
Several remarks on the relation between ethics and politics
show the persistence of thought on the subject even when all
influence of political philosophy on practice had for the time
ceased. Comparing the virtues of the city and of the individual, Proclus allows that, as the city is greater in magnitude, its virtues are more conspicuous: on the other hand,
found in
Plato's ruling class, he
is
selected,
it,
is
branch of training,
is, literary and ethico-religious
and not specially for proficiency in the gymnastic or physical
branch. After their selection, at once for natural capacity and
progress made, they are to be trained in science and philosophy
(mathematics and dialectic) 3. In another passage, he touches
that
in
first
but not in the second (that of the Laws), is that in the second
private property and separate families are permitted. For
the sympathies of women are by nature with private rather
than with public interests and with the part rather than the
whole*. This
1
'
i.
217, 10-16:
al rrjs SXris
I
'^
ry yap
r6\em
oynif ixias
Aperal rdv
ttAXis,
<ei>
Kal
Mves
fvxvs
/ieifwv
r;
/ims
i/'UX'?'.
ttjs
p-epurpiip
tA d/iepiffTepa tv Swifiei Kpareiv tCiv els r\etova
TrXuivav
to iMrrio Kar' dpiBfiAv irepip^peiu rrj Sv,>6./iH twv
WMiam
Kara t4 TToabv. There is a strikingly similar thought in Victor Hugo's
moins que ShakeShakespeare. "A beaute ^gale, le Eamayana nous touohe
ond encore que le moi
speare. Le moi d'un homme est plus vaste et plus prof
d'un peuple."
'
The point about order in time is not put quite so distinctly
i. 218-219.
by Proclus, but seems to be implied.
avuTraeiaTepov ^iati to fl^Xw ^epX rb fSiov toS Appivosi. 257, 1-6: xal yap
^panvvTos, Ss
tjniaiv
hiiro<pepofiivo,v, Kal
"
188-192.
i.
e^ffiy
is
300
may
be educed in
all; for
It was worth
remark because it is essentially his own
reply to one of Aristotle's arguments against the Platonic
communism as an ideal. Men, says Aristotle, neglect what
concerns only the public, and take more interest in what is
their own. True, answers Proclus, but Aristotle himself has
pointed out, in reply to those who would have the human
while to
make
this
interests to those
part,
foundation of
all.
This
is,
spirit, desire)
and
scientifically considered,
is
the
an im-
The
rjv
ovv a<r(pa\h /Mcpurnov clcrayaydvTa xai xpTj/idrwK xal vraiSav xal els yweuKots
ii.
ti\(ay
*'"'' rCiv
ipx^v,
i^tt'
aiiTTJs ttjs
/iipefftv
301
a position
we have
already
He
repeats
by
The best
made
mode
of
life^.
clear,
What the
can never be
entirely self-dependent. It is dependent finally on the astronomical order; and the total revolution of this would have its
scientific expression, if that were discoverable, in a mathe-
number
matical formula.
indicates
As
is
suffering
that
human
from
life
immediate cause he
For
it
is
This
is elfiapfievT),
left,
fails
its detail.
all
know-
pwn^- The legislator gave them the hint that, among other
things, knowledge of the cosmic periods was needed. It was
1
ii.
2,
16-20.
' ii-
29-30.
' ii.
74.
THE COMMENTARIES OF
302
for
PROCIiTJS
them
to discover
in the application of
causes.
is
if its
fo:
coming to be wen
is
recognised.
Since
existence
Proclus,
is
often denied.
put himself, on a level with Plato in genius; and still less car
his age be compared with Plato's age as a social medium foi
dialectical discussion. Yet, out of a passing generality ol
Plato, after the continuous thinking of eight centuries, he is
able to educe a statement of philosophical rationalism equal
in precision to any that is to be found in Kant after the much
longer but profoundly discontinuous period since. Knowledge of truth, says Plato,
ment and
is
acquired
by
experience, judg-
ii.
79.
'
ii.
49, 12-15 :
e[
iKpdrov xal
ti6i>ris
""'o'^?
otaiis, oiS'
rah Sw&iieaui Siitrraait Kal ivapiiorrla. But down even to the lowest stage
symbolised by the iron race of Hesiod, there is imitation of reason: ufiriref
KoX (rlSrjpos d/ivSpiv ^x^' "'P^' ^^^ l^pyvpov r^s
XP^^
iireiKatrlav ii4\as
dv xari
rb irXeiirrov' xal yap t& tradTjTiKdp ^x^^ tpavTOffiay fUfietaBoL vovv idiXovtrav xa
X470I', iuiBevovaav hi 5ii t^v pLerd Trjs CXtjs evipyeiav (ii. 77, 14rl8).
*
Sep.
The
iz.
582 a
e/iireiptif
re Kal
<t>poviiiTH
Kal \byif.
303
project the
itself.
viz.,
a providential order".
is
against
bolical
Against those
argues that they are fitting for the instruction of souls like
ours that are imaginative as well as intellectual. So
much is it
some of the
Trjs ifiiretptas,
Seirpiv,
t^s
Si4yvuKeii
ip.<t>ai>l!;ei
ii.
i]
dXX'
riiv
'
irt' Xeyotfirijs)
Kal
102, 10-14:
o!
xaTii.
lUv o!v
rip
5''
""
101.
ii.
to
yvilipiiM iroi
^pixTjcris,
ylyeaSal 0O(rt
vtav tcl
cis iJXtjs
iiiireiptat libvov
awi r&v
1"""
xeipdviav
to
iroiiuriTav
oi liurBol ttjs
re
SoiO(ri)i'i)s el(rl
Kal
ttis iSiKlat,
304
it is
is
we put
still
hint at
Thus
ii.
'
ii.
ToliiiV
107-108.
108, 27-30 :
dyaduPt
(Sv deal
irois juer'
305
far creduhty
many
commonly
strange things
be-
little
we
when we come
to his scientific
from that of
Porphyry, for example, to be that he is even more strenuous in
keeping it clear of dualistic animism.
doctrine,
it, is
"entrance"
its
(cT'^^^ecn^);
name given
to a
(vTro/ceifievw).
mode
of relation
conceived as in
is
the
is
its
inner reality a
corporeal motions^.
all
(occasionally used
by Proelus) these
In modern la;nguage
pheno-
ii.
^ ii.
122-123.
125, 6-8
TTJs irxi(T(iiK
.
'
ii.
dXXA
cfcoSos ftin
aiiTTJs
ij
<rx^<ris,
l|oSos 5i
airdXvais.
125, 23-25
TroffCv
Kivfitreuv iv
tJ ^vxV
f)
Tapa-
rSelyiiaTa irpov^iiTTiiKei'.
-'
ii.
Kiv^ire<ri
' ii.
' ii.
ofioioji,
vixav Si ev rats
rb TrXeoceKToOv.
128, 1
W.
rriv
20
306
by Plotinus,
is
modification.
'
ii.
145.
'
ii.
ii.
152. This
is
ii.
irpoffeTtr-ev
also the
is
by renewal
of
riir SiKrpi.
6 /wdos.
i<rTl,
ii.
159-160
rah
-xftovlan
162, 14-17.
ii
fiiv
/icTa^oMi
ye eixdrui, in
aW &woKa/wi<rais koI
T\iiira8elats
307
of the past
perception,
But
all
soul,
he adds with
is
endless time.
So, at the other extreme, the greatest of criminals, the
is punished for a whole cosmic period. The period of
a thousand years of punishment or reward assigned to most
souls between one birth and another is not to be understood
as an actual period of which the portions can be counted, but
as indicating a certain type of periodicity belonging to
genesis'. The soul of the despot differs from the other souls
that are punished in being incurable for a whole great cycle
of the world of birth. He cannot reppnt of his crimes, but
can only try to escape*; his escape being, in the myth, prevented by the closing of the egress and by certain demons.
Repentance means self-accusation and the inward return to
tyrant,
is
external justice:
when
it
does not
Wholes.
Passing to the astronomical symbolism, which comes next,
Proclus interprets the "pillar of light" as signifying the cor1
' ii.
177, 26-29.
XI^^As oketis ris ipiB/ibs etvai rais
' ii.
Trap' ii/iwv
ri
y&inv ^/vxais,
iSis
eftro^ei' vpbrrepov,
iii'OKaTiurTdffeus.
* ii.
180, 6-8.
5 ii.
178. Cf.
eavTi} fiev
ii.
drSWuTat,
rots di
el /ai ffS/us
els
airi
Koffi}(cou<ro' ir^iifrof.
202
308
poreal,
verse,
unmoved,
the uni-
poreals''.
The Necessity that involves all things in its order and gives
them their revolution is not that of Matter, which is at the
remotest extreme from active causation, but
is
the divine
The adamant
the indissoluble
signifies
As
if
is
conceived as a
The hypotheses
ii.
196.
'
ii.
198, 7-10:
ti
dffi6/toT4s
lanv
t6 re yi,p
[6 tAttos]
awfiiiTiK6s.
x<i)/M(77-6i' ffiifiaros
is
here more
rd-TTOS
'
ii.
tJv
ISiov oialas
6.v etrj
el otn
vovv re BeoKo-
ii.
225, 11-14: xoi yi,p ^ yvSxns Kal toO ovtos iiropiyerai Kcd t^s fufls, Si&n
iSiXovaa ri, ovra Kal oi p-bvov ix
233-235.
iroieTv i^ ii>6s.
309
themselves irrational; they do not even save the appearances i. The true rule of method is the Pythagorean precept,
to bring the apparent anomalies in the celestial motions to
uniformity by the fewest and simplest hypotheses ^ Why not,
he asks, anticipating Bruno, let the stars move of themselves
devices?
it is free,
it
once for
all
ii.
^ ii.
229-230.
230, 3-5:
Si'
I.
i\axliTra'' Kal airXovfTATWn {nroB4a-euv xp^voi rliv 0awooipavlav &i7v96vei.v eis o/iaK&TriTa Kal ri^iv. Cf. in Alcib.
ebitu Set Kal dirXowrd425, 6-10: tos ivoBiaea Travraxov rCiv Xbyiop IKaxltrras
yip &v iiSWov uffi TomlSc, TOffoirif t?s amiroeirov Xeyo/iirtis iwurT-nftVi
ras- So-v
234
itrvvBirinv,
oEos
ourot
310
by
In the
choices in time.
myth
there
not one
is
life
The
and chance.
lot,
The real order is that of discriminating justice accordThose that come first are the
on the mode of
life
chosen*.
The best-endowed
souls
do not
myth, the
first in
order chooses ill, the last well. And even when the choice has
been made, and the type of life fixed with its events', it is not
determined as good or bad; the soul can live well or ill within
it*. In short, Proclus had the idea of those modem deter*
ii.
275, 1719:
ital
o8tus (oikoi
jcoi irav
to ivSexiiievov
els
ivayKalar
/iera-
ivdexofJtii^ois
aXXois eiroiUvuiv.
' ii.
276.
'
ii.
/iu^Te
dXXd
ii.
Si TTjv
t /Uf
;8ios i,ToviiXiTai
tOv ^vxSf
liEXXovs
fi'^re
vAvTav
aXXais, Cf.
ii.
Ttv^s TLalv,
' ii.
'
ets
^uxais Kal
ii.
273-274.
Bep. x. 618
B.
ii.
'"'fii
284.
rrjs aXpiaeins,
iut&
311
who make personality something deeper than characCharacter he holds to be still plastic to inward impulses;
so that, while the soul had never open
it all choices without
minists
ter.
limit, it
its
limitations.
life',
and
tion;
is
this is the
meaning when
it is said,
alria iXofievov,
0609 dvairioi;^.
first
to choose as seizing
is
By
a partial anticipation of
will'.
' ii.
272, 20 : iroXXuc
"
ii.
dK6\ov8a
'
*
'
ii.
efs
fcScrui'.
oi idivov to elSos
1%"
Sep. X. 617 E.
ii. 297, 1-5: naX SKai
p-cyiXn lih
(piffei xpWi"^"''''
t&vtijIV
els
%Ss
oi
*''
dXXck Kal
r4
vpoeLiro/iev.
' (i'^"^",
Trjs fto^s,
ijSri
at irpd^eis
^vxav
elaiv
t4 iiiyurra rue ko-kCiv (Kal elpnrai iip,tv 6 X670S Kal Iv fiXXois TroXXdKis).
'
t4 /xkv oBk atna -rqs TOia&rris rpayipSlas etval (priaiv &(j>po(rii>7}v
ii. 291 11-14
Kal "Kaifiapylav, wv rj /Up ian ttjs yv^uariKrii Swd/ieas ritpXaris, f di ttjs dpi^euis
:
&wipavTOi KTans.
' ii.
297, 6:
el
XPh ToX/iiaavTa
elTreiv.
Cf.
ii.
ixiv eOaroiia
Ket<T$(0.
' This occurs in an imperfectly deciphered passage (ii. 297-298), but there
no doubt about the interpretation. The god in whose history the symbolism
kingdom from his father and afterwards
is found is Cronos, who seized the
devoured his own children, ^a misfortune assigned by Plato to the soul that
is
312
by
And
he
so,
having taken the upward path without the exercise of their own intellect, such souls are unable to recognise
in heaven the intellect in accordance with which power determines the order of the whole; for like is known by like^.
generalises,
the periods of
least
life',
leads to a dis-
human
history.
rule
at
is
age to age
characteristic of
is
human
society, in distinction
literally,
in the
same work
out
cries
against the poets for letting the heroes, while they are in the
body,
feel as
life
of a
irdvTa rbv
KhiT.fiov diotKoAffTjs,
iroWuv Apxovffav
^
fierd.
^Trei
t^oiTJS
&vdyK7js di^vafuv,
ii.
fiveau) Kal dlXXas aXXcDK /nelfous Kai SvvaTUripai, o6ev Kal airal Swdfieus iiplevrai
d^ovTos
Cf.
ii.
yiyvii)ffKeiv,
326, 15-16:
rd rpia
ff^veffriv^
dyaddnjs
S6vap.LS voOi,
Rep. x. 620 A.
ii.
305-308.
this
commentary
of
The most
so forth 1.
refers to
Orpheus.
highest.
by.
and the immortality that is, continuity of memory and conto be attributed to monads at the stage of " apperception." The souls of animals too are conceived as permanent
individuals going on to shape for themselves new bodies.
This was no doubt the view of Plotinus; but it is not definitely that of Proclus. For him, only rational souls are
certainly both individual and immortal; though these, as we
sciousness
^ ii.
315-317. Cf.
view in Plotinus
ii.
cf .
Enn.
in. 4, 2
8<roi
di
ala-$-/i(rei
dXV
human
soul can
of a brute.
314
have
rational '-
be,
by
purification
memory
Yet the more distinctive thought of Proclus, running through this and other commentaries, seems to be that
for the perfection of the universe and of each soul all possibilities must be realisedj and that the possibilities of a soul
can be completely realised in no one life, even when it chooses
and finds the best.
Republic.
is
TO Si 6/toXo7e?
Tliuv &66,vaTOV.
(raipuis,
Srav \iyri
irepl
'
toOto fibvov
'
tSiv iv
INDEX OF NAMES
Aedesiua, 121, 131, 132, 133
Benn, A. W., 11
Aenesidemus, 32
Aeschylus, 2
Agathias, 182
n., 14,
71
n.,
205
Boccaccio, 194
Bosanquet, B., 90 n,
Bouillet, M. N., 192 n.
Bruno, Giordano, 21, 196, 197, 198,
214, 251 n., 277, 286, 2S7, 309
Brutus, 3
Burnet, J., 7 n., 9 n., 266
Caesar, 3, 252
4 n,
Cambyses, 1 n.
Campanella, 198
Cameades, 118
Cato the Censor, 120
Cato of Utica, 3, 12 n.
Celsus, 136, 139, 144
Caligula,
Clement of Alexandria, 26
Commodus, 4
AsclepiodotuB, 184
267
199
Cyril, St (Bishop of Alexandria), 144,
145, 155
Critias, 266,
Cudworth,
19,
n.
INDEX OF NAMES
316
Dexippus, 134
Diocletian, 3, 137
Diogenes (the Cynic), 138
Diogenes (Neo-Platonist), 182
Dionysius the Areopagite, 187, 188,
191
Diotima, 292
DodweU, H. (the elder), 122 n.
Drummond, J., 35 n.
Duns Scotus, 193, 194
Empedocles,
272 n.
10,
210,
120,
211,
EucUd, 225
156
Hierocles (Pro-consul of Bithynia),
137, 144
Hippocrates, 93
206, 217
Hobbes,
8, 198, 199,
Homer,
'
Eulalius, 182
vm;
304,
305
Justinian, 144, 155, 157, 181, 182, 183
Eustathius, 131
Juvenal, 21
Leibniz,
Hadrian, 117
Hatch, E., 18 n.
Lucian, 21
Lucretius, 11 n., 27 n., 199
HeraoUtus, 9, 35, 36
272 n.
Herennius, 31
200, 203,
313
n.,
72,
267,
Lyall, A.
C, 237
n.
INDEX OF NAMES
Marinus, 143, 157-160, 180, 187,
234 n.
Marlowe, 266
Matter, J., 26, 219, 220 n., 224
Maurice, F. D., 135 n., 248
Mazimus, 133
MeUte, 132
MUton, 266, 292 n.
Mirandola, Pico della, 163 n.
Moore, G. E., 275n.
Morbeka, William of, 161, 234
More, H., 199
Moses, 38, 139, 140, 145 ff.
Ockham, WiUiam
110,
111,
112,
113,
156
n.,
246
of,
82,
92,
100,
99,
101,
n.,
103,
105
n.
194
308
157
Olympiodorus
109,
56,
(commentator
on
222
Pericles,
121
Numa, 150
n.,
108,
Pompey, 252
ff.
156
KemesiuB, 185
Nero, 4 n., 16 n.
Neumaim,
317
245
Petrarch, 6, 194
PreUer, L.
See Hitter
Priscianus, 182
Prisons, 133, 134
n., 105,
137, 221
Philoponus, 157
n.,
182
n.,
184
n.
132
156
Read, C, 208 n.
Beinach, Th., 38
n.
Renan, E., 4
n.,
139
ff.
n.,
183
n.,
189
n.,
270
Ritter,
R.
H. and PreUer, L.
P.
Historia
The
(cited as
references
Philosophiae
are
to
Oraecae,
n.,
n.,
INDEX
318
Roberts,
W. Rhys,
NAMES
OB"
31 n.
Tannery,
P., 9 n.
Taylor, T., 161 n., 192 n.
Bogatianus, 28
Rohde, E., 17
n.
(Pretorian
Sallust
Julian), 135,
under
Prefect
304
Salonina, 29
Theodoret, 137
Theodoric, 186
Sextus Empiricus, 32
Shakespeare, 299 n.
SheUey, P. B., 202, 298
Sidney, P., 196
Siebeok, H., 43, 52, 71 n., 205, 222
Simon, J., 26, 37 n., 76 n., 83 n., 108,
113 n.
SimpUcius, 182, 183, 210, 233
4 n.
Timaeus Locrus, 265
Tiberius,
232; in Supplement
locutor in Dialogues
Socrates
(ecclesiastical
as
il.
n.,
92,
252
Virgfl,
inter-
1^5
Solomon, 151
Solon, 267, 269
Sopater, 122 n., 131
Sorel, G., 18 n.
Sosipatra, 132
Spencer, H., 213, 216, 217, 300
Spenser, E., 202
Speusippus, 166 n.
'
n.
Xerxes, 1 n.
E.
Zeller,
Die
der
Orieehea,
4th ed. : n. 2, m. I, m. 2,
3rd ed.), 12 n., 22, 32, 34, 35 n.,
71 n., 76 n., 83 n., 93, 101, 104,
105, 110 n., 122 n., 131 n., 134 n.,
135, 156 n., 157 n., 158 n., 159 n.,
160 n., 162, 163 n., 181, 182 n.,
183, 184 n., 231, 235 n., 274 n.
Zeno (the Eleatic), 250, 251
u.
Philoaophie
1,
Zeno (the
Zoroaster, 109
Stoic), 12
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