Book 5 — 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