Chapter VII: Plotinos's Indebtedness to Numenius (1)

1. HISTORICAL RELATIONS BETWEEN NUMENIUS AND PLOTINOS.

We have, elsewhere, pointed out the historic connections between Numenius and Plotinos. Here, it may be sufficient to recall that Amelius, native of Numenius's home-town of Apamea, and who had copied and learned by heart all the works of Numenius, and who later returned to Apamea to spend his declining days, bequeathing his copy of Numenius's works to his adopted son Gentilianus Hesychius, was the companion and friend of Plotinos during his earliest period, editing all Plotinos's books, until displaced by Porphyry. We remember also that Porphyry was Amelius's disciple, before his spectacular quarrel with Amelius, later supplanting him as editor of the works of Plotinos. Plotinos also came from Alexandria, where Numenius had been carefully studied and quoted by Origen and Clement of Alexandria. Further, Porphyry records twice that accusations were popularly made against Plotinos, that he had plagiarized from Numenius. In view of all this historical background, we have the prima-facie right to consider Plotinos chiefly as a later re-stater of the views of Numenius, at least during his earlier or Amelian period. Such a conception of the state of affairs must have been in the mind of that monk who, in the Escoreal manuscript, substituted the name of Numenius for that of Plotinos on that fragment[573] about matter, which begins directly with Numenius's name of the divinity, "being and essence."[574]

2. NUMENIUS AS FATHER OF NEO-PLATONISM.

Let us compare with this historical evidence, that which supports the universally admitted dependence of Plotinos on his teacher Ammonius. We have only two witnesses: Hierocles and Nemesius; and the latter attributes the argument for the immateriality of the soul to Ammonius and Numenius jointly. No doubt, Ammonius may have taught Plotinos in his youth; but so no doubt did other teachers; and of Ammonius the only survivals are a few pages preserved by Nemesius. The testimony for Plotinos's dependence on Numenius is therefore much more historical, as well as significant, in view of Numenius having left written records that were widely quoted. The title of "Father of Neo-platonism," therefore, if it must at all be awarded, should go to Numenius, who had written a "History of the Platonic Succession," wherein he attempts to restore "original" Platonism. This fits the title "Neo-platonism," whereas the philosophy of Ammonius, would be better described as an eclectic synthesis of Platonism and Aristotelianism.

3. CONTRAST BETWEEN THEM.

Of course we shall admit that there are differences between Plotinos and Numenius, at least during his Porphyrian period; this was inevitable while dismissing his Numenian secretary Amelius,[575] a friend "who had become imbued with" such doctrines before becoming the friend of Plotinos, who persevered in them, and wrote in justification thereof. We find that the book chronologically preceding this one is v. 5, on the very subject at issue between Amelius and Porphyry. Plotinos took his stand with the latter, and therefore against the former, and through him, against Numenius; and indeed we find him opposing several Gnostic opinions which can be substantiated in Numenius: the creation by illumination or emanation,[576] the threefoldness of the creator,[577] and the pilot's forgetting himself in his work.[578]

But, after all, these points are not as important as they might seem; for in a very little while we find Plotinos himself admitting the substance of all of these ideas, except the verbiage; he himself uses the light and ray simile, the "light of light;"[579] he himself distinguishes various phases of the allegedly single intelligence,[580] and the soul, as pilot of the body incarnates by the very forgetfulness by which the creator created.[581]

Further, as we shall show, during his last or Eustochian period after Porphyry had taken a trip to Sicily to avoid suicide, he himself was to return to Numenian standpoints. This may be shown in a general way as follows. Of the nine Eustochian essays[582] only two[583] betray no similarities to Numenian ideas, while seven[584] do. On the contrary, in the Amelio-Porphyrian period,[585] written immediately on Amelius's dismissal, only six[586] are Numenian, and six[587] are non-Numenian. In the succeeding wholly Porphyrian period,[588] we have the same equal number of Numenian[589] and non-Numenian[590] books. An explanation of this reversion to Numenian ideas has been attempted in the study of the development in Plotinos's views. On the whole, therefore, Plotinos's opposition to Numenius may be considered no more than episodic.

4. DIRECT INDEBTEDNESS OF PLOTINOS TO NUMENIUS.

As Plotinos was in the habit of not even putting his name to his own notes; as even in the times of Porphyry the actual authorship of much that he wrote was already disputed; as even Porphyry acknowledges principles and quotations were borrowed, we must discover Numenian passages by their content, rather than by any external indications. As the great majority of Numenius's works are irretrievably lost, we may never hope to arrive at a final solution of the matter; and we shall have to restrict ourselves to that which, in Plotinos, may be identified by what Numenian fragments remain. What little we can thus trace definitely will give us a right to draw the conclusion to much more, and to the opinion that, especially in his Amelian period, Plotinos was chiefly indebted to Numenian inspiration. We can consider[591] the mention of Pythagoreans who had treated of the intelligible as applying to Numenius, whose chief work was "On the Good," and on the "Immateriality of the Soul."

The first class of passages will be such as bear explicit reference to quotation from an ancient source. Of such we have five: "That is why the Pythagoreans were, among each other, accustomed to refer to this principle in a symbolic manner, calling him 'A-pollo,' which name means a denial of manifoldness."[592] "That is the reason of the saying, 'The ideas and numbers are born from the indefinite doubleness, and the One;' for this is intelligence."[593] "That is why the ancients said that ideas are essences and beings."[594] "Let us examine the (general) view that evils cannot be destroyed, but are necessary."[595] "The Divinity is above being."[596]

A sixth case is, "How manifoldness is derived from the First."[597] A seventh case is the whole passage on the triunity of the divinity, including the term "Father."[598]

Among doctrines said to be handed down from the ancient philosophers[599] are the ascents and descents of souls[600] and the migrations of souls into bodies other than human.[601] The soul is a number.[602]

Moreover, Plotinos wrote a book on the Incorruptibility of the soul,[603] as Numenius had done;[604] and both authors discuss the incorporeity of qualities.[605]

Besides these passages where there is a definite expression of dependence on earlier sources, there are two in which the verbal similarity[606] is striking enough to justify their being considered references: "Besides, no body could subsist without the power of the universal Soul." "Because bodies, according to their own nature, are changeable, inconstant, and infinitely divisible, and nothing unchangeable remains in them, there is evidently need of a principle that would lead them, gather them, and bind them fast together; and this we name soul."[607] This similarity is so striking that it had already been observed and noted by Bouillet. Compare "We consider that all things called essences are composite, and that not a single one of them is simple," with "Numenius, who believes that everything is thoroughly mingled together, and that nothing is simple."[608]

5. UNCERTAIN INDEBTEDNESS OF PLOTINOS.

As Plotinos does not give exact quotations and references, it is difficult always to give their undoubted source. As probably Platonic we may mention the passage about the universal Soul taking care of all that is inanimate;[609] and "When one has arrived at individuals, they must be abandoned to infinity."[610] Also other quotations.[611] The line "It might be said that virtues are actualizations,"[612] might be Aristotelian. We also find:[613] "Thus, according to the ancient maxim, 'Courage, temperance, all the virtues, even prudence, are but purifications.'" "That is the reason that it is right to say that the 'soul's welfare and beauty lie in assimilating herself to the divinity.'" This sounds Platonic, but might be Numenian.

In this connection it might not be uninteresting to note passages in Numenius which are attributed to Plato, but which are not to be identified: "O Men, the Mind which you dimly perceive is not the First Mind; but before this Mind is another one, which is older and diviner." "That the Good is One."[614]

We turn now to thoughts found identically in Plotinos and Numenius, although no textual identity is to be noted. We may group these according to the subject, the universe, and the soul.

6. PARTICULAR SIMILARITIES.

God is supreme king.[615] Eternity is now, but neither past nor future.[616] The King in heaven is surrounded by leisure.[617] The Good is above Being;[618] the divinity is the unity above the "Being and Essence;[619] and connected with this is the unitary interpretation of the name A-pollo,[620] following in the footsteps of Plutarch. Nevertheless, the inferior divinity traverses the heavens,[621] in a circular motion.[622] While Numenius does not specify this motion as circular,[623] it is implied, inasmuch as the creator's passing through the heavens must have followed their circular course. With this perfect motion is connected the peculiar Numenian doctrine of inexhaustible giving,[624] which gave a philosophical basis for the old simile of radiation of light,[625] so that irradiation is the method of creation,[626] and this is not far removed from emanationism. This process consists of the descent of the intelligible into the material, or, as Numenius puts it, that both the intelligible and the perceptible participate in the ideas.[627] Thus intelligence is the uniting principle that holds together the bodies whose tendency is to split up, and scatter,[628] making a leakage or waste,[629] which process invades even the divinity.[630] This uniting of scattering elements produces a mixture or mingling,[608] of matter and reason,[631] which, however, is limited to the energies of the existent, not to the existent itself.[632] All things are in a flow,[633] and the whole all is in all.[634] The divinity creates by glancing at the intelligence above,[635] as a pilot.[636] The divinity is split by over-attention to its charges.[637]

This leads us over to consideration of the soul. The chief effort of Numenius is a polemic against the materialism of the Stoics, and to it Plotinos devotes a whole book.[638] All souls, even the lowest, are immortal.[639] Even qualities are incorporeal.[640] The soul, therefore, remains incorporeal.[641] The soul, however, is divisible.[642] This explains the report that Numenius taught not various parts of the soul,[643] but two souls, which would be opposed by Plotinos in his polemic against the Stoics,[644] but taught in another place.[645] Such divisibility is indeed implied in the formation of presentation as a by-product,[646] or a "common part."[647] Moreover, the soul has to choose its own demon, or guardian divinity.[648] Salvation as a goal appears in Numenius,[649] but not in Plotinos, who opposes the Gnostic idea of the "saved souls,"[650] though elsewhere he speaks of the paths of the musician,[651] lover[652] and philosopher[653] in reaching ecstasy.[654] Still both Gnostics and Plotinos insisted on the need of a savior.[655] Memory is actualization of the soul.[656] In the highest ecstasy the soul is alone with the alone.[657]

7. SIMILARITIES APPLIED DIFFERENTLY.

This comparison of philosophy would have been much stronger had we added thereto the following points in which we find similar terms and ideas, but which are applied differently. The soul is indissolubly united to intelligence according to Plotinos, but to its source with Numenius.[658] Plotinos makes discord the result of their fall, while with Numenius it is its cause.[659] Guilt is the cause of the fall of souls, with Plotinos,[660] but with Numenius it is impulsive passion. The great evolution or world-process is by Plotinos called the "eternal procession," while with Numenius it is progress.[661] The simile of the pilot is by Plotinos applied to the soul within the body; while with Numenius, it refers to the logos, or creator in the universe,[662] while in both cases the cause,--of creation for the creator,[663] and incarnation for the soul[664]--is forgetfulness. There is practically no difference here, however. Doubleness is, by Plotinos, predicated of the sun and stars, but by Numenius, of the demiurge himself,[665] which Plotinos opposes as a Gnostic teaching.[666] The Philonic term "legislator" is, by Plotinos, applied to intelligence, while Numenius applies it to the third divinity, and not the second.[667] Plotinos extends immortality to animals, but Numenius even to the inorganic realm, including everything.[668] While Numenius seems to believe in the Serapistic and Gnostic demons,[669] Plotinos opposes them,[670] although in his biography[671] he is represented as taking part in the evocation of his guardian spirit in a temple of Isis.

We thus find a tolerably complete body of philosophy shared by Plotinos and Numenius, out of the few fragments of the latter that have come down to us. It would therefore be reasonable to suppose that if Numenius's complete works had survived we could make out a still far stronger case for Plotinos's dependence on Numenius. At any rate, the Dominican scribe at the Escoreal who inserted the name of Numenius in the place of that of Plotinos in the heading of[672] the fragment about matter, must have felt a strong confusion between the two authors.

8. PHILOSOPHICAL RELATIONS BETWEEN NUMENIUS AND PLOTINOS.

To begin with, we have the controversy with the Stoics, which, though it appears in the works of both, bears in each a different significance. While with Numenius it absorbed his chief controversial efforts,[673] with Plotinos[674] it occupied only one of his many spheres of interest; and indeed, he had borrowed from them many terms, such as "pneuma," the spiritual body, and others, set forth elsewhere. Notable, however, was the term "hexis," habituation, or form of inorganic objects,[675] and the "phantasia," or sense-presentation.[676] Like, them, the name A-pollo is interpreted as a denial of manifoldness.[677]

Next in importance, as a landmark, is Numenius's chief secret, the name of the divinity, as "being and essence," which reappears in Plotinos in numberless places.[678] Connected with this is the idea that essence is intelligence.[679]

9. PYTHAGOREAN SIMILARITIES.

It is a common-place that Numenius was a Pythagorean, or at least was known as such, for though he reverenced Pythagoras, he conceived of himself as a restorer of true Platonism. It will, therefore, be all the more interesting to observe what part numbers play in their system, especially in that of Plotinos, who made no special claim to be a Pythagorean disciple. First, we find that numbers and the divine ideas are closely related.[680] Numbers actually split the unity of the divinity.[681] The soul also is considered as a number,[682] and in connection with this we find the Pythagorean sacred "tetraktys."[683] Thus numbers split up the divinity,[684] though it is no more than fair to add that elsewhere Plotinos contradicts this, and states that the multiplicity of the divinity is not attained by division;[685] still, this is not the only case in which we will be forced to array Plotinos against himself.

The first effect of the splitting influence of numbers will be doubleness,[686] which, though present in intelligence,[687] nevertheless chiefly appears in matter,[688] as the Pythagorean "indefinite dyad."[689] Still, even the Supreme is double.[690] So we must not be surprised if He is constituted by a trinity,[691] in connection with which the Supreme appears as grandfather.[692]

If then both Numenius and Plotinos are really under the spell of Pythagoras, it is pretty sure they will not be materialist, they will believe in the incorporeality of the divinity,[693] of qualities;[694] and of the soul[695] which will be invisible[696] and possess no extension.[697] A result of this will be that the soul will not be located in the body, or in space, but rather the body in the soul.[698]

From this incorporeal existence,[699] there is only a short step to unchangeable existence,[700] or eternity.[701] This, to the soul, means immortality,[702] one theory of which is reincarnation.[703] To the universe, however, this means harmony.[704]

There are still other Pythagorean traces in common between Numenius and Plotinos. The cause that the indeterminate dyad split off from the divinity is "tolma," rashness, or boldness.[705] Everything outside of the divinity is in a continual state of flux.[706] Evil is then that which is opposed to good.[707] It also is therefore unavoidable, inasmuch as suppression of its cosmic function would entail cosmic collapse.[708] The world stands thus as an inseparable combination of intelligence and necessity, or chance.[709]

10. PLATONIC TRACES.

Platonic traces, there would naturally be; but it will be noticed that they are far less numerous than the Pythagorean. To begin with, we find the reverent spirit towards the divinities, which prays for their blessing at the inception of all tasks.[710] To us who live in these latter days, such a prayer seems out of place in philosophy; but that is only because we have divorced philosophy from theology; in other words, because our theology has left the realm of living thought, and, being fixed once for all, we are allowed to pursue any theory of existence we please as if it had nothing whatever to do with any reality; in other words, we are deceiving ourselves. On the contrary, in those days, every philosophical speculation was a genuine adventure in the spiritual world, a magical operation that might unexpectedly lead to the threshold of the cosmic sanctuary. Wise, indeed, therefore, was he who began it by prayer.

Of other technical Platonic terms there are quite a few. The lower is always the image of the higher.[711] So the world might be considered the statue of the Divinity.[712] The ideas are in a realm above the world.[713] The soul here below is as in a prison.[714] There is a divinity higher than the one generally known.[715] The divinity is in a stability resultant of firmness and perfect motion.[716] The perfect movement, therefore, is circular.[717] This inter-communion of the universe therefore results in matter appearing in the intelligible world as "intelligible matter."[718] By dialectics, also called "bastard reasoning,"[719] we abstract everything[720] till we reach the thing-in-itself,[721] or, in other words, matter as a substrate of the world.[722] Thus we metaphysically reach ineffable solitude.[723]

The same goal is reached psychologically, however, in the ecstasy.[724] This idea occurred in Plato only as a poetic expression of metaphysical attainment; and in the case of Plotinos at least may have been used as a practical experience chiefly to explain his epileptic attacks; and this would be all the more likely as this disease was generally called the "sacred disease." Whether Numenius also was an epileptic, we are not told; it is more likely he took the idea from Philo, or Philo's oriental sources; at least Numenius seems to claim no personal ecstatic experiences such as those of Plotinos.

We have entered the realm of psychology; and this teaches us that that in which Numenius and Plotinos differ from Plato and Philo is chiefly their psychological or experimental application of pure philosophy. No body could subsist without the soul to keep it together.[725] Various attempts are made to describe the nature of the soul; it is the extent or relation of circumference to circle.[726] Or it is like a line and its divergence.[727] In any case, the divinity and the soul move around the heavens,[728] and this may explain the otherwise problematical progress or evolution ("prosodos" or "stolos") of ours.[729]

11. VARIOUS SIMILARITIES.

There are many other unclassifiable Numenian traces in Plotinos. Two of them, however, are comparatively important. First, is a reaffirmation of the ancient Greek connection between generation, fertility of birth of souls and wetness,[730] which is later reaffirmed by Porphyry in his "Cave of the Nymphs." Plotinos, however, later denies this.[731] Then we come to a genuine innovation of Numenius's; his theory of divine or intelligible giving. Plato had, of course, in his genial, casual way, sketched out a whole organic system of divine creation and administration of this world. The conceptions he needed he had cheerfully borrowed from earlier Greek philosophy without any rigid systematization, so that he never noticed that the hinge on which all was supposed to turn was merely the makeshift of an assumption. This capital error was noticed by Numenius, who sought to supply it by a psychological observation, namely, that knowledge may be imparted without diminution. Plotinos, with his winning way of dispensing with quotation-marks, appropriated this,[732] as also the idea that life streams out upon the world in the glance of the divinity, and as quickly leaves it, when the Divinity turns away His glance.[733]

Other less important points of contact are: the Egyptian ship of souls;[734] the Philonic distinction between "the" God as supreme, and "god" as subordinate;[735] the hoary equivocation on "kosmos;"[736] and the illustration of the divine Logos as the pilot of the world.[737]

VALUE OF PLOTINOS.

IMPORTANCE IN THE PAST.

We must focus our observations on Plotinos as a philosopher. To begin with, we should review his successors, Porphyry, Jamblichus, Sallust, Proclus, Hierocles, Simplicius;[738] Macrobius;[739] Priscus; Olympicdorus and John Philoponus.[740]

Among the Arabian philosophers that follow in his steps are Maimonides and Ibn Gebirol.[741]

Of the Christian fathers we first have two who paraphrased, rather than quoted him.

St. Augustine by name quotes i. 6; iii. 2; iv. 3, and v. 1; he paraphrases parts of i. 2; ii. 1; iii. 6, 7; iv. 2, 7; vi. 5, 6.[742] St. Basil so closely paraphrases parts of Plotinos in his treatise on the Holy Spirit,[743] his letter on the Monastic Life,[744] and his Hexameron,[745] that Bouillet prints the passage in question in deadly parallel.

Other Christian Plotonic students were Gregory of Nyssa, Synesius, Dionysius the Areopagite, Theodorus, Aeneas of Gaza, Gennadius;[746] Victorinus;[747] Nicephorus Chumnus;[748] and Cassiodorus.[749]

Thomas Aquinas also was much indebted to Plotinos; and after him came Boethius, Fénélon, Bossnet and Leibnitz (all quoted in Bouillet's work).

We have frequently pointed out that Plotinos' "bastard reasoning" process of reaching the intelligible was practically paraphrased by Kant's dialectical path to the "thing-in-itself." This dialetic, of course, was capitalized by Hegel.

Drews has shown that Edouard von Hartmann used Plotinos' semi-devotional ecstasy as a metaphysical basis for his philosophy of the Unconscious.

It is, of course, among mystics that Plotinos has been accorded the greater honor. His practical influence descended through the visions and ecstasies of the saints down to Swedenborg, who attempted to write the theology of the ecstasy; and the relation between these two, Swedenborg and Plotinos should prove a fertile field for investigation.

CULTURAL IMPORTANCE.

Summarizing, he formed a bridge between the pagan world, with its Greco-Roman civilization, and the modern world, in three departments: Christianity, philosophy, and mysticism. So long as the traditional Platonico-Stoical feud persisted there was no hope of progress; because it kept apart two elements that were to fuse into the Christian philosophy. Numenius was the last Platonist, as Posidonius was the last Stoic combatant. However, if reports are to be trusted, Ammonius was an eclecticist, who prided himself on combining Plato with Aristotle. If Plotinos was indeed his disciple, it was the theory eclecticism that he took from his reputed teacher. Practically he was to accomplish it by his dependence on the Numenian Amelius, the Stoic Porphyry, and the negative Eustochius. It will be seen therefore that his chief importance was not in spite of his weakness, but most because of it. By repeatedly "boxing the compass" he thoroughly assimilated the best of the conflicting schools, and became of interest to a sufficiency of different groups (Christian, philosophical and mystical) to insure preservation, study and quotation. His habit of omitting credit to any but ancient thinkers left his own work, to the uninformed--who constituted all but a minimal number--as a body of original thought. Thus he remains to us the last light of Greece, speaking a language with which we are familiar, and leaving us quotations that are imperishable.

PERSONAL VALUE.

While therefore providentially Plotinos has ever been of great importance theologically, philosophically and mystically, we cannot leave him without honestly facing the question of his value as an original thinker. It is evident that his success was in inverse ratio to originality; but we can also see that he could not have held together those three spheres of interest without the momentum of a wonderful personality. This will be evident at a glance to any reader of his biography. But after all we are here concerned not so much with his personality as with his value as an original thinker. This question is mooted by, and cannot be laid aside because of its decisive influence on the problem of his dependence of Numenius. The greater part of the latter's works being irretrievably lost, we can judge only from what we have; and as to the rest, we must ask ourselves, was Plotinos the kind of a man who would have depended on some other man's thoughts? Is he likely to have sketched out a great scheme and filled it in; or rather, was he likely to depend on personal suggestion, and embroider on it, so to speak. Elsewhere we have demonstrated a development of his opinions, for instance, about matter. Was this due to progressiveness, or to indefiniteness? The reader must judge for himself.

PERSONAL LIMITATIONS.

His epilepsy naturally created an opportunity for, and need of a doctrine of ecstasy; which for normal people should be no more than a doctrine, or at least be limited to conscious experiences. Even his admirer, Porphyry, acknowledges that he spelled and pronounced incorrectly.[750] He acknowledged that without Porphyry's objections he would have nothing to say. He refrained from quoting his authorities, and Porphyry acknowledged that his writings contained many Stoic and Aristotelian doctrines. It was generally bruited around that his doctrines were borrowed from Numenius,[751] to the extent that his disciples held controversies, and wrote books on the subject. His style is enigmatic, and the difficulty of understanding him was discussed even in his own day. He was dependent on secretaries or editors; first on Amelius, later on Porphyry, who does not scruple to acknowledge he added many explanations.[752] Later, Plotinos sent his books to Porphyry in Sicily to edit. No doubt the defectiveness of his eyesight made both reading and writing difficult, and explains his failure to put titles to his works; though, as in the case of Virgil, such hesitation may have been the result of a secret consciousness of his indebtedness to others.

RELIANCE ON PUNNING.

Punning has of course a hoary antiquity, and even the revered Plato was an adept at it--as we see in his Cratylos. Moreover, not till a man's work is translated can we uncover all the unconscious cases of "undistributed middle." Nevertheless, in an inquiry as to the permanent objective validity of a train of reasoning, we are compelled to note extent and scope of his tendency. So he puns on aeons;[753] on science and knowledge;[754] on "agalmata";[755] on Aphrodite, as "delicate";[756] on Being;[757] on "koros," as creation or adornment";[758] on difference in others;[759] on idea;[760] on heaven, world, universe, animal and all;[761] on Vesta, and standing;[762] on Hexis;[763] on inclination;[764] on doxa;[765] on love and vision;[766] on "einai" and "henos;"[767] on "mous," "noêsis," and to "noêfon";[768] on paschein;[769] on Poros;[770] on Prometheus and Providence;[771] on reason and characteristic;[772] on "schesis" and "schema";[773] and "soma" and "sozesthai";"[774] on suffering;[775] on thinking, thinkable, and intellection;[776] on "timely" and "sovereign."[777] It will be noted that these puns refer to some of the most important conceptions, and are found in all periods of his life. We must therefore conclude that his was not a clear thinking ability; that he depended on accidental circumstances, and may not always have been fully conscious how far he was following others. This popular judgment that he was revamping Numenius's work may then not have been entirely unfounded, as we indeed have shown.

Nevertheless, he achieved some permanent work, that will never be forgotten; for instance:

1. His description of the ecstatic state.

2. His polemic against the Aristotelian and Stoic categories.

3. His establishment of his own categories.

4. His allegoric treatment of the birth of love, the several Eroses, Poros and Penia, and other myths.

5. His building of a Trinitarian philosophy.

6. His threefold spheres of existence, underlying Swedenborgian interpretation.

7. His aesthetic theories.

8. His ethical studies of virtues and happiness.

9. His restatement of Numenius's arguments for the immateriality of the soul.

SELECTED MAXIMS

The reader may be interested in a few maxims selected from Plotinos' works which may be of general interest.

1. We develop toward ecstasy by simplification of Soul.

2. We rise by the flight of the Single to the Single, face to face.

3. We contain something of the Supreme.

4. The Soul becomes what she remembers and sees.

5. Everything has a secret power.

6. The best men are those who have most intimacy with themselves.

7. The touch of the good man is the greatest thing in the world.

8. Every being is its best, not when great or numerous, but when it belongs to itself.

9. There are two men in us, the better and the worse.

10. The secret of life is to live simultaneously with others and yourself.

11. God is the author of liberty.

12. Concerning what would it be most worth while to speak, except the Soul? Let us therefore know ourselves.

13. Without virtue, God is but a name.

14. The object of virtue is to separate the soul from the body.

15. We can never become perfect, because he who thinks himself so has already forgotten the supreme divinity towards which he must hasten.

16. The world was created by a concurrence of intelligence and necessity.

17. The Soul is the image, word, and interpreter of the One.

18. The divinities though present to many human beings often reveal themselves only to some one person, because he alone is able to contemplate them.

19. To act without suffering is the sign of a great power.

20. Only virtue is independent.

21. We are beautiful when we know ourselves.

22. The Soul is the child of the universal Father.

23. True happiness is being wise, and exercising this within oneself.

24. To become again what one was originally is to live in the Superior world.

25. The desired goal is not to cease failing, but to grow divine.

26. Virtue demands preliminary purification.

27. Our effort at assimilation should be directed not at mere respectability, but at the gods themselves.

28. One should study mathematics in order to accustom oneself to think of incorporeal things, and to believe in their existence.

29. Soul is not in body, but body in Soul.

30. The Soul's higher part remains in heaven.

31. We should not leave the earth, but not be of it.

32. The object of life is not to avoid evil, or copy the good, but to become good.

33. Dying, to Eustochius: "I am awaiting you, in order to draw the divine in me to the divine in all."

FOOTNOTES:

[1] It is significant that the subject of the first treatise of Plotinos, after the departure of Porphyry, should treat of happiness as the object of life. These may have been the arguments he advanced to persuade Porphyry to abstain from suicide (to which he refers in sections 8, 16), and, rather, to take a trip to Sicily, the land of natural beauty. He also speaks of losing friends, in section 8. The next book, on Providence, may also have been inspired by reflections on this untoward and unexpected circumstance. We see also a change from abstract speculation to his more youthful fancy and comparative learning and culture.

[2] Diog. Laert. x.; Cicero, de Fin. i. 14, 46.

[3] Cicero, de Fin. 11, 26.

[4] See Arist. Nic. Eth. vii. 13; Sextus Empiricus, Hypotyp. Pyrrhon, iii. 180; Stob. Ecl. ii. 7.

[5] Arist. Nic. Eth. i. 10, 14.

[6] Stob. Floril. i. 76.

[7] See vi. 8.

[8] In Plutarch, of Wickedness, and in Seneca, de Tranquil, Animi, 14.

[9] De Providentia, 3.

[10] De Provid. 5.

[11] Aeschylus, Seven Against Thebes, 327.

[12] The vegetative soul, the power that presides over the nutrition and growth of the body; see iv. 3.23.

[13] See i. 8; also Numenius, 16.

[14] i. 2.4.

[15] Cicero, Tusculans. ii. 7.

[16] The animal; see i. 1.10.

[17] See i. 1.8, 10.

[18] See the Theataetus, p. 176. Carv. 84; the Phaedo. p. 69, Cary, 37; the Republic, vi. p. 509; Cary, 19; x. p. 613, Cary, 12; the Laws, iv. p. 716, Cary, 8; also Plotinos i. 2.1.

[19] See i. 9.

[20] A Stoic confutation of Epicurus and the Gnostics. As soon as Porphyry has left him, Plotinos harks back to Amelius, on whose leaving he had written against the Gnostics. He also returns to Numenian thoughts. Bouillet notices that here Plotinos founded himself on Chrysippus, Marcus Aurelius, and Epictetus, and was followed by Nemesius. This new foundation enabled him to assume a rather independent attitude. Against Plato, he taught that matter derived existence from God, and that the union of the soul and body is not necessarily evil. Against Aristotle, he taught that God is not only the final, but also the efficient cause of the universe. Against the Stoics, he taught that the human soul is free, and is a cause, independent of the World Soul from which she proceeded. Against the Gnostics, he insisted that the creator is good, the world is the best possible, and Providence extends to mundane affairs. Against the Manicheans, he taught that the evil is not positive, but negative, and is no efficient cause, so that there is no dualism.

[21] Diog. Laert. x. 133.

[22] See iv. 2.4; vi. 7; see Plato, Philebus, p. 30, Cary, 56; Philo, Leg. Alleg, vi. 7.

[23] Lactantius, de Ira Dei, 13.

[24] Ireneus, Ref. Her. ii. 3.

[25] As in vi. 7.1.

[26] Philo, de Creatione Mundi, 6.

[27] As the Gnostics taught; see ii. 9.1.

[28] As was held by the Gnostics, who within the divinity distinguished potentiality and actuality, as we see in ii. 9.1.

[29] See ii. 9.3. 8.

[30] Numenius, 32.

[31] Plato, Timaeus, p. 48, Cary, 21. Statesman, p. 273, Cary, 16; Laws, x. p. 904, Cary, 12.

[32] See ii. 9.2.

[33] From Aristotle, de Anima, 2.

[34] This is the Aristotelian psychological scheme.

[35] Clem. Al.; Strom. v. p. 712; Stobaeus, Ecl. Phys. i. p. 372, 446.

[36] iv. 8.12; Plato, Tim. p. 41. 69; Cary, 16, 44.

[37] Stob. Ecl. Eth. ii. 7.

[38] iii. 2.13.

[39] p. 253; Cary, 74.

[40] Sen. 526.

[41] According to Plato's Theaetetus, p. 176, Cary, 83; Numenius,16.

[42] Seneca, de Provid. 2.

[43] In his Republic, ix. p. 585, Cary, 10.

[44] See iii. 1.9.

[45] See iv. 3.12.

[46] See iv. 3.5.

[47] Gregory of Nyssa, Catech. Orat. 7.

[48] As thought Sallust, Consp. Cat. 52.

[49] Republic x. p. 620; Cary, 16; Numenius, 57.

[50] As said Sallust, Conspiration of Catiline, 52.

[51] As thought Epictetus, Manual, 31.

[52] In his Republic, vi. p. 488; Cary, 4.

[53] Marcus Aurelius. Thoughts, xi. 18.

[54] As thought Cicero, de Nat. Deor. iii. 63. 64.

[55] As thought Philo, de Prov. in Eus. Prep. Ev. viii. 14.

[56] According to Plato, in the Sophist and Protagoras, and the Stoics, as in Marcus Aurelius. Meditations, vii. 63.

[57] As did the writer of Revelation, iv. 6.

[58] In his Timaeus, p. 29e, Cary, 10.

[59] As said Chrysippus in Plutarch, de Comm. Not. adv. Stoicos, 13.

[60] Mentioned by Plato in his Phaedrus, p. 248, Cary, 59; Republ. v. p. 451, Cary, 2; and in the famous hymn of Cleanthes, Stobaeus Ecl. Phys. i. 3.

[61] Like the figure of the angel Mithra; see Franck, LaKabbale, p. 366.

[62] As Hierocles wondered, de Prov. p. 82, London Ed.

[63] In the words of Plato's Timaeus p. 48; Cary, 21; and Theaetetus, p. 176; Cary, 84; Numenius, 16.

[64] Almost the words of John i. 1.

[65] In the Laws, vii. p. 796, Cary, 6; p. 815, Cary, 18; and Philo, de Prov. in Eus. Prep. Ev. viii. 14.

[66] As thought Epictetus in his Manual, 2, 6.

[67] In his Philebus, p. 48, Cary, 106.

[68] As thought Epictetus in his Manual. 8.

[69] See iii. 8.

[70] Numenius, 32.

[71] Plato, Banquet, p. 187, Cary, 14.

[72] Marcus Aurelius, Medit. ii. 13.

[73] As thought Marcus Aurelius, in his Thoughts, xii. 42.

[74] See iv. 3.24.

[75] In his Manual, 37.

[76] See iv. 1.9-12.

[77] Marcus Aurelius, Medit. vii. 9; Seneca, Epist. 94.

[78] Numenius, iii. 7.

[79] This image was later adopted by Swedenborg in his "celestial man."

[80] In close proximity to note 45, another distinctly Johannine expression.

[81] Stoic ideas.

[82] As Plato said in his Phaedrus, p. 247, Cary, 56.

[83] See i. 8.2.

[84] See ii. 3.17.

[85] See ii. 3.13. Ficinus's translation.

[86] A Stoic term.

[87] Plato, Timaeus, p. 42, Cary, 17; see also Enn. ii. 3.10. 11, 15, 16.

[88] Timaeus, p. 42, 91, Cary, 17, 72, 73.

[89] See ii. 3.13.

[90] Alcinous, de Doctrina Platonica, 26.

[91] Gregory of Nyssa, Catech. Oratio, 7; Dionysius Areopagite, Divine Names, 4.

[92] See ii. 3.7.

[93] See iii. 2.6.

[94] Plato, Timaeus, p. 31c, Cary, 11.

[95] See Numenius. 14.

[96] Clem. Al. Strom. v. 689.

[97] In this book we no longer find detailed study of Plato, Aristotle and the Epicureans, as we did in the works of the Porphyrian period. Well indeed did Plotinos say that without Porphyry's objections he might have had little to say.

[98] Porphyry, Principles of the theory of the Intelligibles, 31.

[99] Olympiodorus, in Phaedonem, Cousin, Fragments, p. 404.

[100] Ib., p. 432.

[101] Ib., p. 418.

[102] Ib., p. 431.

[103] John Philoponus, Comm. in Arist., de Anima, i. 1.

[104] See iii. 6.1.

[105] By a triple pun, on "nous," "noêsis," and "to noêton."

[106] Porphyry, Principles, 32.

[107] By a pun.

[108] See John i. 4, 9.

[109] This anticipates Athanasius's explanations of the divine process.

[110] See v. 1.4.

[111] Porphyry, Principles, 26.

[112] The Eleusynian Mysteries, Hymn to Ceres, 279; see vi. 9.11.

[113] See v. 3.14.

[114] In this book Plotinos harks back to the first book he had written, i. 6, to Plato's Banquet and Cratylos. Porphyry later agreed with some of it. Like St. John, Plotinos returns to God as love, in his old age. His former book had also been a re-statement of earlier thoughts.

[115] See iii. 5.6.

[116] See i. 6.2, 3.

[117] See i. 6.3, 7.

[118] Plato, Banquet, p. 206-208, Cary, 31, 32.

[119] Plato, Banquet, p. 210, Cary, 34, sqq.

[120] Porphyry, Biography of Plotinos, 15.

[121] See i. 3.2.

[122] See sect. 5, 6.

[123] Plato, Banquet, p. 185, Cary, 12, 13.

[124] By Plato, in his Cratylus, p. 396, Cary, 29, 30; interpreted to mean "pure Intelligence."

[125] This is the principal power of the soul; see ii. 3.17.

[126] See v. 8.12, 13.

[127] Plotinos thus derives "eros" from "orasis," which, however far-fetched a derivation, is less so than that of Plato, from "esros," meaning to "flow into," Cratylos, p. 420, Cary, 79, 80.

[128] For this distinction, see ii. 3.17, 18.

[129] For the two Loves, see v. 8.13, and vi. 9.9.

[130] See iii. 4.

[131] See iv. 9.

[132] Plato, Banq. 203: Cary, 29.

[133] In his Isis and Osiris, p. 372, 374.

[134] See i. 1.

[135] Plato, Banquet, p. 202, Cary, 27, 28; Porphyry, de Abst. ii. 37, sqq.

[136] In section 4.

[137] Plato, Epinomis, p. 984, Cary, 8; Porphyry, de Abst. ii. 37-42.

[138] See ii. 4.3.

[139] See ii. 4.3.

[140] An expression often used by the Platonists; see the Lexicon Platonicum, by the grammarian Timaeus, sub voce "oistra."

[141] See Plato, Banquet, p. 203, Cary, 29.

[142] See iii. 4.6.

[143] See iii. 4.3.

[144] A Stoic distinction.

[145] P. 246, Cary, 56.

[146] P. 28, Cary, 50.

[147] Didymus, Etym. Magn. p. 179, Heidelb. p. 162, Lips.

[148] Timaeus Locrius, of the Soul of the World, p. 550, ed. Gale, Cary, 4.

[149] Origen, c. Cels., iv. p. 533.

[150] "logoi."

[151] Proclus, Theology of Plato, vi. 23.

[152] As the generation of the world, in Plato's Timaeus, p. 28, 29, Cary, 9; and the erecting into separate Gods various powers of the same divinity, as Proclus said, in his commentary thereon, in Parm. i. 30.

[153] ii. 3.17; ii. 9.2.

[154] Pun on "Poros" and "euporia."

[155] See ii. 4.16.

[156] See books ii. 3; ii. 9; iii. 1, 2, 3, 4, for the foundations on which this summary of Plotinos's doctrine of evil is contained. To do this, he was compelled to return to Plato, whose Theaetetus, Statesman, Timaeus and Laws he consulted. Aristotle seems to have been more interested in natural phenomena and human virtue than in the root-questions of the destiny of the universe, and the nature of the divinity; so Plotinos studies him little here. But it will be seen that here Plotinos entirely returns to the later Plato, through Numenius.

[157] As thought Empedocles, 318-320.

[158] i. 6.2.

[159] i. 8.7.

[160] i. 8.3.

[161] As thought Plato in his Laws, iv. p. 716; Cary, 7, 8.

[162] As thought Plato in his Philebus, p. 28; Cary 49, 50.

[163] See v. 1; vi. 9.2.

[164] Numenius, fr. 32.

[165] As said Plato, in his second Letter, 2.312.

[166] See iii. 8.9; iv. 7.14; vi. 4.2; vi. 9.2.

[167] As held by Plato in the Parmenides and First Alcibiades.

[168] See ii. 4.8-16.

[169] It is noteworthy that Plotinos in his old age here finally recognizes Evil in itself, just as Plato in his later work, the Laws (x. p. 897; Cary, 8) adds to the good World-soul, an evil one. This, for Plotinos, was harking back to Numenius's evil world-soul, fr. 16.

[170] In his First Alcibiades, p. 122; Cary, 37.

[171] See i. 1.12.

[172] This means created things, which are contingent and perishable; see ii. 4.5, 6.

[173] See ii. 4.10-12. This idea of irradiation is practically emanationism; and besides Plotinos's interest in orientalism (Porphyry Biography, 3), it harks back to Numenius, fr. 26.3; 27a.10.

[174] Held by Plato in his Theaetetus, p. 176; Cary, 84, 85; and Republic, ii. 279; Cary, 18, and of Numenius, fr. 16.

[175] See i. 2.1.

[176] In the Theaetetus, p. 176; Cary, 84, 85.

[177] Numenius, fr. 10; Plato, Rep. vi. p. 509b; Cary, 19.

[178] As Plato suggested in his Philebus, p. 23; Cary, 35-37.

[179] Numenius, fr. 17.

[180] Mentioned by Plato in the Timaeus, pp. 28, 30, 38; Cary, 9, 10, 14.

[181] From the Timaeus, p. 41; Cary, 16, 17.

[182] See i. 2.1; i. 6.8.

[183] That is, the relative inferiority of beings which, proceeding from each other, become more and more distant from the good; see ii. 5.5; ii. 9.8, 13; v. 1; Philo, Leg. Alleg. ii. p. 74.

[184] See i. 8.1.

[185] ii. 4.12.

[186] Numenius, fr. 26.3.

[187] Diog. Laertes vii.

[188] See ii. 6.

[189] ii. 4.13.

[190] i. 8.15.

[191] As thought Plato in his Banquet, p. 211; Cary, 35.

[192] As said Plato, Republic, vii. p. 534; Cary, 14.

[193] As Plato says in his Phaedrus, p. 246; Cary, 54, 56.

[194] As wrote Plato in his Banquet, p. 203; Cary, 28, 29, and see iii. 7.14 and iii. 5.9 as well as iii. 6.14.

[195] According to the interpretation of Ficinus.

[196] See ii. 4. This is an added confirmation of the chronological order; in the Enneadic order this book is later, not earlier.

[197] Again a term discussed by Numenius, fr. ii. 8, 13; and iii; see i. 1.9; iv. 3.3, 30, 31; i. 4.10.

[198] We notice how these latter studies of Plotinos do not take up any new problems, chiefly reviewing subjects touched on before. This accounts for Porphyry's attempt to group the Plotinic writings, systematically. This reminds us of the suggestion in the Biography, that except for the objections of Porphyry, Plotinos would have nothing to write. Notice also the system of the last Porphyrian treatises, contrasted with the more literary treatment of the later. All this supports Porphyry's table of chronological arrangement of the studies of Plotinos. This book is closely connected with the preceding studies of Fate and Providence, iii. 1-3; for he is here really opposing not the Gnostics he antagonized when dismissing Amelius, but the Stoic theories on Providence and Fate.

[199] See iii. 1.5, 6; iii. 6; iv. 4.30-44.

[200] Macrobins. In Somn. Scipionis.

[201] Cicero, de Divinatione, i. 39.

[202] Julius Firmicus Maternus, Astrol. ii. 23.

[203] With Ptolemy's Tetrabiblion, i. p. 17.

[204] See iv. 4.31.

[205] Discussed in par. 4.

[206] This incomprehensibility was no doubt due to Plotinos's advancing blindness and renal affection.

[207] Numenius, fr. 32.

[208] Cicero, de Nat. Deorum, ii. 46.

[209] See iv. 4.32.

[210] According to the Stoics: Alex. Aphrod. de Mixtione, p. 141; Cicero, de Nat. Deorum, ii. 32.

[211] See iii. 1.4, 7-10.

[212] See iii. 1.6.

[213] See iv. 4.33.

[214] See iv. 4.35; according to the Stoics, see Diogenes Laertes. vii. 140.

[215] See iv. 4.32.

[216] Seneca, Quest. Nat. i. 1.

[217] See iii. 4.2, 4.

[218] See ii. 3.13.

[219] See iii. 4.3.

[220] See iii. 1.8-10.

[221] The law of Adrastea; see iii. 4.2; iv. 4.4, 5.

[222] Plato, Phaedrus, p. 244-251; Cary, 47-66.

[223] See i. 8; ii. 11; iii. 1; vi. 8.

[224] Plato, Rep. x. p. 617; Cary, 14.

[225] p. 41-42; Cary, 16, 17.

[226] See i. 1.7-10.

[227] See ii. 1.5.

[228] Stoic terms.

[229] See ii. 1.8-10.

[230] See i. 2.1; vi. 8.

[231] See i. 1.7-12; iv. 3.19-23.

[232] This is the exact doctrine of Numenius, fr. 53; it logically agrees with the doubleness of matter, Num. 14; of the Creator, Num. 36; and the world-Soul, fr. 16. See note 71.

[233] See par. 18.

[234] Plato, Banquet, p. 202; Cary, 28; Timaeus, p. 90; Cary, 71.

[235] See iii. 1.2.

[236] That is, to share the passions of the bodies: see iii. 1.2.

[237] See iv. 4.38-40.

[238] Seneca, Nat. Quest. ii. 32.

[239] According to Aristotle, Met. xii. 3.

[240] See iii. 1.6.

[241] See Cicero, de Nat. Deor. ii. 34.

[242] See iv. 4.39, 40.

[243] Plato, Phaedrus, p. 248; Cary, 59.60.

[244] See iii. 1.8-10.

[245] See iv. 4.39.

[246] See iii. 4.3.

[247] See iii. 1.10.

[248] See iii. 1.5.

[249] Rep. x. p. 616; Cary, 14; Enn. iii. 4.

[250] See iv. 4.30, 40, 43, 44.

[251] See i. 4.

[252] See i. 2.5.

[253] In i. 1; proof of the chronological order.

[254] See ii. 9.12; iv. 3.9, 10; negatively.

[255] See iii. 3.1, 2; see Seneca, de Provid. 5.

[256] See ii. 3.17; iii. 8.

[257] See iv. 4.9-12.

[258] See ii. 4; Seneca, de Provid. 5.

[259] See ii. 9.2; iii. 2, 3. Seneca, de Provid. 5.

[260] Or generative reasons, a Stoic term, Seneca, Quest. Nat. iii. 29; see iii. 3.1, 2, 7.

[261] Plotinos is here harking back to his very earliest writing, 1.6, where, before his monistic adventure with Porphyry, he had, under the Numenian influence of Amelius, constructed his system out of a combination of the doctrines of Plato (about the ideas), Aristotle (the distinctions of form and matter and of potentiality and actualization), and the Stoic (the "reasons," "seminal reasons," action and passions, and "hexis," or "habit," the inorganic informing principle). Of these, Numenius seems to have lacked the Aristotelian doctrines, although he left Plato's single triple-functioned soul for Aristotle's combination of souls of various degrees (fr. 53). Plotinos, therefore, seems to have distinguished in every object two elements, matter and form (ii. 4.1; ii. 5.2). Matter inheres potentially in all beings (ii. 5.3, 4) and therefore is non-being, ugliness, and evil (i. 6.6). Form is the actualization (K. Steinhart's Melemata Plotiniana, p. 31; ii. 5.2); that is, the essence and power (vi. 4.9), which are inseparable. Form alone possesses real existence, beauty and goodness. Form has four degrees: idea, reason, nature and habit; which degrees are the same as those of thought and life (Porphyry, Principles 12, 13, 14). The idea is distinguished into "idea" or intelligible Form, or "eidos," principle of human intellectual life. Reason is 1, divine (theios logos, i. 6, 2; the reason that comes from the universal Soul, iv. 3.10), 2, human (principle of the rational life, see Ficinus on ii. 6.2); 3, the seminal or generative reason (principle of the life of sensation, which imparts to the body the sense-form, "morphé," 3.12-end; Bouillet, i. 365). Now reasons reside in the soul (ii. 4.12), and are simultaneously essences and powers (vi. 4.9), and as powers produce the nature, and as essences, the habits. Now nature ("physis") is the principle of the vegetative life, and habit, "hexis," Numenius, fr. 55, see ii. 4.16, is the principle of unity of inorganic things.

[262] As thought Aristotle, Met. xii, 3.

[263] See ii. 9.13.

[264] See iv. 4.9-13.

[265] See iii. 4.1.

[266] This is Numenius' doctrine, fr. 16.

[267] See iii. 3.5, 11.

[268] Plotinos here makes in the world-Soul a distinction analogous to that obtaining in the human one (where there is a reasonable soul, and its image, the vegetative soul, see i. 1.8-12; iv. 4. 13, 14). Here he asserts that there are two souls; the superior soul (the principal power of the soul, which receives the forms from Intelligence (see iv. 4.9-12, 35), and the inferior soul (nature, or the generative power), which transmits them to matter, so as to fashion it by seminal reasons (see iii. 4.13, 14, 22, 27). Bouillet, no doubt remembering Plotinos's own earlier invectives against those who divided the world-soul (ii. 9.6), evidently directed against Amelius and the Numenian influence, which till then he had followed--tries to minimize it, claiming that this does not mean two different hypostases, but only two functions of one and the same hypostasis. But he acknowledges that this gave the foundation for Plotinos's successors' distinction between the supermundane and the mundane souls (hyperkosmios, and egkosmios). Plotinos was therefore returning to Numenius's two world-souls (fr. 16), which was a necessary logical consequence of his belief in two human souls (fr. 53), as he himself had taught in iii. 8.5. Plotinos objectifies this doubleness of the soul in the myth of the two Hercules, in the next book, i. 1.12.

[269] See ii. 9.2.

[270] The subject announced in the preceding book, ii. 3.16; another proof of the chronological order. This is a very obscure book, depending on iv. 3 and 4: and vi. 7; on the theory of the three divine hypostases, on his psychology, the soul's relation to, and separation from the body, and metempsychosis. His doctrines of "self" and of the emotions are strikingly modern.

[271] See sect. 2.

[272] See sect. 3.

[273] See sect. 4.

[274] See sect. 7, 11.

[275] This most direct translation of "pathos," is defective in that it means rather an experience, a passive state, or modification of the soul. It is a Stoic term.

[276] "Dianoia" is derived from "dia nou," and indicates that the discursive thought is exercised "by means of the intelligence," receiving its notions, and developing them by ratiocination, see v. 3.3. It is the actualization of discursive reason "to dianoêtikon," or of the reasonable soul ("psychê logikê"), which conceives, judges, and reasons (dianoei, krínei, logizetai).

[277] "Noêsis" means intuitive thought, the actualization of intelligence.

[278] See sect. 7.

[279] See Porphyry, Faculties of the Soul, and Ficinus, commentary on this book.

[280] In Greek, "to zoon," "to syntheton," "to synamphoteron," "to koinon," "to eidôlon."

[281] See i. 2.5.

[282] According to the Stoics.

[283] According to Alexander of Aphrodisia.

[284] As thought Aristotle, de Anima 2.1; see 4.3.21, and Numenius, 32.

[285] A famous comparison, found in Aristotle, de Anima, ii. 1; Plato, Laws, x. p. 906; Cary, 14; and especially Numenius, 32.

[286] As Plotinos thinks.

[287] iv. 4.20.

[288] iv. 3.20.

[289] Arist., de Anim. 2.1.

[290] According to Aristotle.

[291] Phaedo, p. 87; Cary, 82.

[292] Similar to the modern James-Lange theory of bodily emotions.

[293] See iv. 4.20, 28.

[294] See sect. 7, 9, 10.

[295] See iv. 3.22, 23.

[296] Porphyry and Ammonius in Bouillet, i. Intr. p. 60, 63, 64, 75, 79, 93, 96, 98, and note on p. 362 to 377.

[297] Namely, intelligence and the reasonable soul.

[298] See Bouillet, i. p. 325, 332.

[299] Bouillet, Intr. p. lxxviii.

[300] See Bouillet, i., note, p. 327, 341.

[301] One of the three hypostases.

[302] See Bouillet, i. p. lxxiii. 344-352.

[303] Plato, Timaeus, p. 35; Cary, 12.

[304] These images of the universal Soul are the faculties of the soul, sense-power, vegetative power, generative power or nature; see iv. 4.13, 14.

[305] "Turning" means here to incline.

[306] See St. Paul, Rom. for phantasy, or imagination; vii. 7-25.

[307] See iv. 3.29-31, also i. 1.9; Numenius, fr. ii. 8, 19; iii. See section 10.

[308] See i. 2.5.

[309] iv. 3.19, 23.

[310] See ii. 9.3, 4, 11, 12.

[311] Fancy or representation, i. 4.10; iv. 3.3, 30, 31.

[312] See 4.3.19, 23; 6.7.6.7.

[313] Plato, Rep. x. p. 611; Cary, 11.

[314] For this see 4.3.12, 18; 4.8.

[315] Odyss. xi. 602, 5; see 4.3.27.

[316] We find here a reassertion of Numenius's doctrine of two souls in man, fr. 53.