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NEOPLATONISM
IN RELATION TO
CHRISTIANITY
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NEOPLATONISM
IN RELATION TO
CHRISTIANITY
AN ESSAY
CHARLES ELSEE, M.A.
Sometime Scholar and Naden Divinity Student
of St John's College, Cambridge
CAMBRIDGE :
at the University Press
1908
Cantbrttige :
PRINTED BY JOHN CLAY, M.A.
AT THE UNIVERSITY PRESS.
GENERAL
PREFACE
THE following pages are the expansion of an
essay which was awarded the Hulsean Prize
in 1901, and they are now published in accordance
with the terms of that bequest. In apologising for
the long interval which has elapsed between the award
of the prize and the publication of the essay, the
author can only plead the pressure of other work,
first at a College Mission in Walworth, and latterly
at Leeds. At the same time this very delay has
enabled him to grasp what a real bearing the specu-
lations of the Neoplatonists, and their adaptations by
the Christian Fathers, have upon much that is being
said and written at the present day. Let the reader
for instance compare what Plotinus or Augustine has
to say on the subject of evil with the teaching of the
" New Theology," and he will at once see how thoughts
which are floating in men's minds to-day have been
expressed with discrimination in the past. Or let him
join the crowd that listens to the street-corner preacher
of materialism, and then notice how * Dionysius ' deals
with the question of finite man's comprehension of an
infinite God. Truly, if we wish to see beyond the
182302
VI PREFACE
giants of the past, there is much to be said for
climbing on their shoulders.
The subject of the essay is " Neoplatonism in re-
lation to Christianity." The addition of this qualifying
clause serves to limit the field of the enquiry, and
to differentiate its object from that of a history of
philosophy. The writer of such a history regards
Neoplatonism purely from a philosophical stand-
point. He draws out its relation to earlier and
later systems, and seeks to assign to it its proper
place in the development of human thought. Neo-
platonism however was not merely a great philo-
sophical revival : it was a part of a yet greater
religious movement: and it is the latter aspect
which this essay has to set forth.
For nearly two hundred years the Christian
Church had been increasing, alike in numerical
strength and in intellectual vigour, until it threatened
not only to rival but absolutely to overpower the old
pagan system of the Roman Empire. Persecution
had been employed against it in vain. It gradually
became obvious that if the new sect was to be exter-
minated, methods must be adopted far more vigorous
and systematic than most of the Emperors were able
or willing to employ, and the last and most statesman-
like of the persecutors endeavoured not so much to
destroy Christianity, as to reduce it to its original
position as a mean and vulgar superstition of the
lower classes.
But direct persecution was not the only weapon
which was levelled against the new religion. There
were intervals of rest for the Church, during which
PREFACE Vll
the struggle was carried on in the form of literary
controversy ; and Neoplatonism was the greatest of
these attempts to meet Christianity on its own ground,
and by fair argument to show the superiority of the
old paganism.
Accordingly the first chapter of this essay has
been devoted to the discussion of the actual state of
religion in the heathen world, at the commencement
of the third century of the Christian era. The next
two chapters deal with the relation of Neoplatonism
to earlier systems of Greek speculation and with the
first beginnings of Christian philosophy, whilst a
fourth chapter has been given up to the general
history of the school, together with the names of
contemporary Christian writers. In the fifth chapter
will be found a more detailed discussion of the
mutual relations between Church and School, trac-
ing their development from apparent alliance to
bitter antagonism, and again, after this period of
antagonism, to the gradual absorption of Neoplatonic
principles by the Church.
C. E.
CLERGY HOUSE, LEEDS.
October 9, 1908.
CONTENTS
CHAP. PAGE
I. ROMAN RELIGION IN THE THIRD CENTURY . I
II. EARLIER SYSTEMS OF GREEK PHILOSOPHY . 22
III. THE FIRST BEGINNINGS OF CHRISTIAN PHI-
LOSOPHY 41
IV. THE HISTORY OF NEOPLATONISM . . . 51
V. THE RELATIONS BETWEEN NEOPLATONISM AND
CHRISTIANITY 82
INDEX 141
LIST OF MODERN WORKS CONSULTED
J. C. I. GlESELER, Text-book of Ecclesiastical History, 1836.
A. N BANDER, History of Christian Religion, trans. Torrey,
1850-58.
F. UEBERWEG, History of Philosophy, Eng. trans. 1872.
F. D. MAURICE, Moral and Metaphysical Philosophy, 1873.
A. HARNACK, History of Dogma, trans. Millar, 1897.
J. E. ERDMANN, History of Philosophy, trans. Hough, 1898.
J. B. CROZIER, History of Intellectual Development, 1897.
H. H. MlLMAN, History of Latin Christianity, 4th Ed. 1883.
RlTTER and PRELLER, Historia Philosophiae Graecae, ed.
Wellman, 1898.
SMITH and WAGE, Dictionary of Christian Biography, 1877-
1887.
J. REVILLE, La Religion a Rome sous les Severes, 1886.
E. HERRIOT, Philon le Juif, 1898.
J. DRUMMOND, Philo Judaeus, 1888.
E. DE FAYE, Clement d' Alexandria, 1898.
T. WHITTAKER, The Neoplatonists, 1901.
T.TAYLOR, Selected works of Plotinus, translated, ed. Mead, 1895.
C. BIGG, Christian Platonists of Alexandria, 1886.
W. R. INGE, Christian Mysticism, 1899.
A. ZIMMERN, Porphyry to Marcella, 1896.
Xll MODERN WORKS CONSULTED
B. F. WESTCOTT, Religious Thought in the West, 1891.
G. H. KENDALL, The Emperor Julian, 1879.
A. GARDNER, Synesius of Cyrene, 1886.
J. C. NlCOL, Synesius of Cyrene, His Life and Writings, 1887.
T. R. GLOVER, Life and Letters in the Fourth Century, 1901.
L. GRANDGEORGE, St Augustin et le Ndoplatonisme, 1896.
E. W. WATSON, Hilary of Poictiers (Library of Nicene and
Post-Nicene Fathers IX, 1899).
W. MOORE and H. A. WILSON, Gregory of Nyssa (Library of
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers v, 1893).
H. F. STEWART, Boethius, 1891.
CHAPTER I
ROMAN RELIGION IN THE THIRD CENTURY
THE period in which Neoplatonism takes its rise
is essentially an age of transition. Lying as it does
between the age of pure Grseco-Roman paganism and
the final triumph of Christianity, it is the period in
which both of the opposing forces are making their
preparations for the last great struggle. Paganism
arms itself with the new philosophy and summons to
its aid all the forces of Roman conservatism ; whilst
Christianity, which has already in great measure
secured its hold on the masses now attacks the
highest circles of society, and endeavours to satisfy
the craving for a true system of religious philosophy.
But before entering upon a detailed discussion
of the religion of the Roman Empire in the third
century1, we may by way of introduction take a
passing glance at the picture which Lucian gives of
1 Throughout this chapter I have ventured for the sake of brevity to
employ, without further qualification, the phrase "the third century."
The period discussed would be more accurately described as the half
century between the death of Commodus and the accession of Philippus
Arabs ; commencing with the accession of Septimius Severus in 193 A.D.,
and extending to the death of Gordianus Junior in the year 244.
E. N. I
2 ROMAN RELIGION IN [l
Roman society and religion in the earlier part of the
second. Shallow and heartless as he is, he neverthe-
less occupies a position of his own. When considering
the evidence of the Christian apologists we are some-
times tempted to think that it must be prejudiced.
The writers are carrying on a controversy against a
system for which they feel that they have something
better to substitute, and whose weak points they are
bound, in spite of themselves, to exaggerate. They
are liable to persecution, and therefore they may tend
to overestimate their own simple faith and purity in
contrast with the unbelief and licentiousness of the
pagan world around them. But Lucian's position is
different. He feels no fear of persecution. He has
no special wish to regenerate or to reform mankind.
He is a satirist, who writes in order to amuse himself
by showing his utter contempt for the dead system
that claimed to be the religion of the Empire.
This contempt is of course most openly expressed
in such works as the Juppiter Tragoedus and the
Dialogues of the Gods. But even if we leave these
satirical works on one side, we still find in Lucian the
clearest evidence of the low state into which religion
had fallen. The memoir of Alexander the False
Prophet and the account of the Death of Peregrinus
are documents of considerable historical value ; and
in these we see, on the one hand the love of notoriety
for which Peregrinus is ready to pay the price even
of self-immolation ; and, on the other, the blind
credulity on which Alexander is able to work by the
crudest of methods — a credulity which is not limited
to the ignorant peasants of Asia Minor, but extends
I] THE THIRD CENTURY 3
to the highest circles of Roman society. And in
both works alike we see the love of sensation which
has taken the place of the old Roman reverence for
religion.
It is a matter for regret that Lucian has not given
us a more complete account of the Christians of his
day. The Church was passing through a great crisis:
she had to face the question whether she was to
remain a small society of religious devotees, or to go
forward and take her place at the head of the great
religions of the world. The Montanists preferred to
remain where they were : the Church as a whole
decided to go forward. At such a time the evidence
of a writer like Lucian would have been of peculiar
interest. But he passes over Christianity almost in
silence. In his authentic works there are perhaps
not more than two direct references to it. He tells
us1 that Alexander was wont, at the commencement
of his "Mysteries" to cry "If any Atheist or Christian
or Epicurean have come to spy upon the Ceremonies,
let him flee." And it is to be remembered that
Alexander would be no mean judge of the audience
best suited for his purpose, so that his warning cry
suggests that the Christians at this time were not
all such simple and credulous folk as we are some-
times inclined to suppose. The other reference to
Christianity occurs in the account of Peregrinus2.
In his younger days this person had professed himself
a Christian, and Lucian describes with mingled
admiration and contempt the way in which his fellow-
Christians tended him during an imprisonment for
1 Lucian, Alex. 38. * Lucian, De Morte Peregrini, 12.
1—2
4 ROMAN RELIGION IN [I
the sake of the faith. This is the passage that gives
us the clearest view of Lucian's own ideas upon the
subject of Christianity. It is too much to say with
Suidas that he is a blasphemer ; for that charge can
only be made good by reference to the pseudo-
Lucianic Philopatris. In the account of Peregrinus1,
the reference to "their crucified sophist" expresses
rather pity for Christian credulity than downright
contempt
Such are the only direct references to Christianity
which are to be found in Lucian's writings. It is
clear that the subject had but little interest for him.
It failed to excite his curiosity, and he practically
ignores it.
With regard however to the condition of pagan
thought in his day, Lucian is a most valuable witness.
He is a man of considerable ability, at once thoroughly
versatile and thoroughly sceptical, whilst his detached
attitude lends especial weight to his opinions. The
impression that we gain from a study of his writings
is that there was no central force in paganism at this
time : the old powers were found to be effete, or, at
the best, to be spasmodic and local in their effects,
and it seemed as though the whole system were
crumbling away through sheer inability to survive.
But it must not be assumed that this would be
equally true as a description of the religion of the
Empire half a century later. In the period between
Lucian and Plotinus there occurred an extraordinary
revival or recrudescence of paganism. This was not
merely a revival of external ceremonial, such as took
1 Ib. 13-
I] THE THIRD CENTURY 5
place in the time of Augustus. It was a genuine refor-
mation, and it led to the growth of a more spiritual
religion than the Roman world had ever known.
Of this revival of paganism no contemporary
historian has left us a complete account. Indirect
evidence however is not wanting. It is to be derived
in abundance from sources at once numerous and
varied. Much can be gathered from heathen writers,
— from historians like Dio Cassius and Lampridius,
from philosophers like Porphyry, and from sophists like
Philostratus. Further contributions may be levied
from Christian writers, from Clement of Alexandria
and Origen, from Tertullian and Augustine. Nor
must the evidence of inscriptions be neglected, which
is invaluable, in this as in other cases, as affording
contemporary corroboration to the statements of our
other authorities.
The characteristic note of Roman society at this
period was its cosmopolitanism. More than one gene-
ration had passed away since Juvenal uttered his
lament1 that the Orontes was emptying itself into
the Tiber, and no attempt had been made to check
the stream of foreign immigration. The aristocracy
of the second century, liberal and progressive as it
had been in matters of legislation, had been com-
paratively conservative in matters of religion. But
the end of that century witnessed a change. The
religious revival of this period affected all classes of
pagan society, and the enthusiasm which it aroused
was expended as much in the welcoming of new
divinities as in the service of the old ones.
1 Juv. 3. 62.
O ROMAN RELIGION IN [I
The mere number of gods and goddesses who
* succeeded in obtaining recognition in the Empire at
this time is astounding. It is impossible within the
limits of the present chapter to do more than mention
the principal classes into which they fall, and to
touch upon one or two of the most important of the
deities. The old Roman gods were still the official
guardians of the state1. Their temples continued to
stand in unimpaired splendour ; they themselves still
received sacrifices on all important occasions ; and
the office of Pontifex Maximus was still conferred
upon each successive Emperor. The old colleges of
priests, augurs, and the like, still existed, and member-
ship in them was an honour that was much sought
after ; whilst the various guilds and societies for
purposes of trade or of mutual benefit all had their
religious aspects.
Of the cults which became prevalent after the fall
of the Republic, the most widespread was the worship
of the Emperor2. As a general rule the Romans did
not attempt to impose the worship of their gods upon
conquered peoples, but in this particular case they
made an exception. The worship of the Emperor
was enforced in order to add to the stability of the
" Empire, by causing men's religious emotions to be
centred on the man in whom the executive power
was vested, and thus to efface those rivalries between
the various towns and tribes which tended to foster a
local and national rather than an imperial patriotism.
As each town was merged in the vast Empire, the
1 J. Reville, La Religion a Rome sous Us Stvtres, p. 26.
2 Reville, p. 30.
Ij THE THIRD CENTURY 7
importance of local politics and local religion tended
to decline, and the place of the local deity was taken
by the Genius of the Empire, worshipped in concrete
form in the person of the Emperor.
To the student of Church History this cult is of
the greatest importance. Its enforced observance
formed, in times of persecution, the dividing line
between Christian and Pagan, and refusal to sacrifice
to the Emperor was regarded as a species of treason.
For the purposes of this essay its chief importance
lies in the fact that it is one of the signs that the
general drift of paganism tended towards some form
of monotheism. The office, rather than the person
of the reigning Emperor, was the real object of
worship : and the many inscriptions extant in honour
of the Wisdom, Justice or Clemency of the Emperor
show how completely he had come to be regarded
as a secondary providence, visible, accessible, and on
earth ; a divinity so near at hand that, according to
Tertullian1, men were more ready to perjure them-
selves by all the gods than by the Genius of the
Emperor. At the same time, the apotheosis of
departed Emperors did not tend to raise the tone of
heathenism. Rather it served to diminish the value
of deity and to place an efficient weapon in the hands
of those who wished to bring discredit upon paganism.
The reigning Emperor was usually worshipped,
not in person, but through the medium of his Genius*.
But the possession of a Genius was not the prerogative
of the Emperor alone. There was a special Genius
for every man, every family, every nation ; we even
1 Tert. Apol. 28. 2 Reville, p. 39.
8 ROMAN RELIGION IN [I
find them assigned to the gods. Their worship was a
survival from the primitive Roman religion which
recognised a special deity for every single department
of life : but the current ideas about the precise nature
of Genii had been considerably modified by the
Greek notions about daemons, and it would seem that
in the third century there was a considerable variety
in the opinions prevalent upon the subject. They
were regarded, sometimes as immanent in the persons
or things to which they were attached, sometimes as
entirely external : some Genii were almost on a level
with the gods, others again were but little higher in
the scale of being than their charges. The Genius of
each individual corresponds closely to the Christian
conception of a guardian angel ; as compared with
the gods he resembles the family doctor, who watches
over the wellbeing of his charges on all ordinary occa-
sions, whilst they are the specialists, one or another of
whom is summoned in cases of emergency.
Similar to the Genii were a number of personifi-
cations of abstract qualities to whom worship was
offered. Such were Honos, Spes, Libertas, Virtus \
the object worshipped being in each case the Genius
of the quality named. How far these were mere
abstractions, and to what extent they were regarded
as actual deities, the worshipper himself would pro-
bably have found it hard to explain.
The belief in Genii was not merely a vulgar
superstition. The philosophers recognised a world of
spirits intermediate between gods and men : beings
whom Celsus describes1 as the proconsuls or satraps
1 Cf. Orig. c. Cels. 8. 35.
I] THE THIRD CENTURY 9
of the gods, and whom Plotinus defines1 as eternal
like the gods, but participating in the material world
like men. There is also, in the writings of the
Christian Fathers, ample evidence of a firm belief in
angelic powers : and, more than this, the Fathers do
not throw any doubt upon either the existence or the
potency of the spirits worshipped by the pagans2.
They differ from heathen writers only in maintaining
that these particular spirits are invariably evil.
The foregoing deities, however orientalised their
worship may have become, were at least Roman in
origin. But the greater part of the conglomeration
of creeds, which formed the religion of the Empire,
was derived from foreign sources3. Egypt and
Carthage, Phrygia and Syria, all sent their respective
contingents to the Roman pantheon : even the wild
German tribes were not unrepresented. It was the
necessary result of the mixed character of the
population. Eastern slaves carried with them super-
stitions from the East : merchants of Alexandria
brought with them Egyptian gods as well as their
wares ; above all, the soldiers, recruited mainly from
the frontiers of the Empire, carried their own deities
and their own forms of worship wherever they went.
Sooner or later the strange gods drifted to Rome,
and, once planted, their worship was bound to spread.
The mere novelty of these foreign cults made them
objects of curiosity : the penal enactments, which
still existed though never enforced, against those who
encouraged strange rites, may have served to give
1 Plot. Enn. 3. 5, 6. 2 Cf. Tert. Apol. 22.
3 Reville, p. 47.
10 ROMAN RELIGION IN [I
them the added attractiveness of forbidden fruit ;
whilst they received a further impetus from the fact
that many of them possessed special orders of priests
whose sole business lay in the propagation of their
religion. But the true cause of their success lay in
the inability of the old Roman religion to satisfy the
spiritual longings of the people. The old worship
had served so long as Rome was struggling for bare
existence ; but even before the beginning of the
Empire there were signs of the prevalence of a
profound sense of religious discontent. Something
less barren, less utterly unspiritual, was required, and
any cult that claimed to supply this need was sure to
be welcomed.
Foremost among the Eastern divinities, which
came crowding into all parts of the Empire, stands
the Egyptian Isis. Temples and statues without
number were erected in her honour : the Emperors
themselves took part in her processions. She was
originally the personification of the female element
in nature, but as time went on she assumed the
attributes of several Greek and Roman goddesses —
Juno, Ceres, Proserpine and Venus — and became
moreover the patroness of shipping and commerce.
She possessed not only an elaborate priesthood, but
a lower order of mendicant brethren ; and the
magnificent ritual in her temples, alike in the daily
worship and on the occasion of great festivals, cannot
but have had its effect on the popular mind.
The other chief Egyptian deities were Osiris, the
dog-headed Anubis, and Serapis, who afterwards
gained greater popularity even than Isis. In the
I] THE THIRD CENTURY II
time of the Syrian Emperors, and in particular under
Septimius Severus, Caracalla, and Alexander Severus,
these Egyptian divinities were in high favour.
It is impossible here to discuss in detail the
systems that were introduced from Phrygia, Syria
and Phoenicia. There was a certain similarity, alike
in organization and in ritual, between all these
Eastern religions. They usually had an order of
priests : often also an order of mendicant friars, whose
sole claim to sanctity seems, in some cases, to have
consisted in their profession of poverty. Their ritual
was characterized by the prevalence of " mysteries "
and by elaborate ceremonial, every detail of which
had its allegorical meaning. But they drew their
supporters from a lower stratum of society than that
with which we are concerned. They could not claim
the immemorial antiquity of the Egyptian cults, and
there was moreover about them a certain lack of
refinement, which could not but be distasteful to the
philosophical mind. They were tolerated, as meeting
the religious needs of those to whom they appealed ;
but they failed to secure the respect and adherence of
men of culture.
There remains however one deity who must not
be passed over1. This is Mithras, the one Persian
divinity who acquired a hold on the Roman Empire.
We first hear of his being brought to Rome in
connexion with Pompey's suppression of the Cilician
pirates2; but his worship attracted but little attention
in the West until the middle of the second century
of the Christian era. Then the Oriental tendency,
1 Reville, p. 77. 2 67 B.C. Cf. Plutarch, Pomp. 24.
12 ROMAN RELIGION IN [l
discernible at Rome under the Antonines, brought
him into favour : Antoninus Pius built a temple in
his honour at Ostia, and Marcus Aurelius built
another on the Vatican. At this period he is men-
tioned, with disdain it is true, but none the less with
obvious apprehension in Lucian's Council of the Gods^.
Under the Severi his popularity grew by leaps and
bounds, and it looked as though in another generation
he would reign supreme.
To the Roman, Mithras was essentially the Sun-
god of purity and power, able and willing to protect
his worshippers in this world and the next. He was
regarded as the creator of the world, the deliverer
from cold and darkness. To many of his worshippers
the moral and mystical teaching was of far greater
importance than the doctrine of Mithras as the ruler
of the physical world. His mysteries dealt probably
for the most part with the future destiny of the soul,
of which he is regarded as the saviour and regenerator.
In the Mithraic catacomb on the Appian Way2 the
course of the soul after death is described : we see it
escorted by Mercury before Pluto and Proserpine, in
the presence of the Fates, and finally conducted to
the banquet of the just
Mithras-worship has been described as the pagan
form of Gnosticism3. In both alike may be traced
the love of mystical speculation ; the growth of the
idea of redemption ; the belief that proper ritual
could atone for a life of evil. It is interesting to
notice that a worshipper could make atonement
1 Deor. Cone. 9. 2 Reville, p. 94.
3 Reville, p. 93.
I] THE THIRD CENTURY 13
without himself undergoing the strain and discomfort
of the ritual. For instance, the most striking of all
the rites of Mithras was the Taurobolium, or baptism
of blood1. This ceremony, whereby the worshipper
was drenched with the warm blood that flowed from
the victim's throat, was supposed to bring certain
regeneration. And it is to be remarked that it could
be performed on a priest for the benefit of some other
person. The stress was laid on the opus operatum of
the magical sacrament, not on the bodily presence of
the individual for whose benefit it was offered.
We cannot here discuss the relation of Mithras-
worship to Christianity. The early Christians were
well aware of the similarity between the rites of
Mithras and those of the Church. Actual connexion
however there appears not to have been, though
Justin Martyr2 and Tertullian8 denounce the washing
of neophytes, the confirmation of the initiated, and
the consecration of bread and water, as diabolical
parodies of Christian sacraments.
The worship of Mithras spread rapidly, and at one
time bid fair to become the final religion of the
Empire. The high morality that it inculcated, and
the almost military discipline that it maintained in
its vast body of devotees seemed to give a promise
of permanence which the other pagan systems could
not offer. But it was not to be. After the time of
Julian, Christianity took its place as the dominant
religion of the West ; and in later days Mahom-
medanism drove out Mithras-worship from its last
strongholds in the Eastern Empire.
1 Reville, p. 96. 2 Apol. i. 66. 3 De Praescr. 40.
14 ROMAN RELIGION IN [l
Such are a few of the main types of religion
prevalent in the Roman Empire during the third
century. No attempt has been made to give a
complete catalogue of the gods who received worship
at this period : whole classes have been omitted
altogether, and no class has been described in its
entirety. But the sketch, fragmentary as it is, may
help to make clear the kind of religion which many
1 of the Neoplatonists felt themselves called upon to
defend. Its most striking characteristic is perhaps
, toleration. Never in the history of Western civilisa-
tion have so many deities been recognised at the same
time. And, paradoxical as it may appear, the general
result of this excessive polytheism was to cause a
' strong current of feeling towards monotheism. Each
deity was regarded as one particular form of "the
. Divine," and this idea received confirmation from the
partial identity of the symbols and attributes ascribed
to different gods.
This is the method by which the philosophers
reconcile themselves to polytheism. " There is one
sun and one sky over all nations" says Plutarch1,
"and one deity under many names." Even Celsus
recognises one deity alone, but he recommends every
nation to maintain its own cults, and so to honour the
sovereign by showing respect to his representative.
The personality of the various gods is thus more or
less passed over. They are, in fact, gods from the
point of view of religion, abstractions from that of
philosophy. And a judicious use of the allegorical
method of interpretation made it a comparatively
1 De hid. et Osir. 67.
I] THE THIRD CENTURY 15
simple matter to reconcile monotheism in theory with
polytheism in practice. It may be well to add a few
words with regard to what has been said about the
attitude of the philosophers, and in particular, of the
/^Neoplatonists, towards pagan polytheism. It is true
that the philosopher, strictly speaking, has nothing to
do with systems of religion. His speculations may
take a theological form, and he may even lay down
general principles as to the means whereby man may
hope to live in harmony with the Deity : but with the
outward forms of religion he has no connexion.
Moreover, in considering the Neoplatonists we are
tempted to imagine that the whole school shared the
lofty position of Plotinus, and to forget that, until
after the time of Julian, no other Neoplatonic writer
confined himself to the discussion of abstract philo-
sophy, or failed to make it clear that he wished
definitely to support the pagan system. How far
Plotinus had in view the defence of paganism, is a
question which will be discussed later : at all events
his contemporaries and his immediate followers
were all tinged with Neopythagoreanism, and hardly
deserve, in its highest sense, the title of Philosophers.
They professed to be rationalists who by specious
explanation could justify the existence of superstitious
observances, but the true state of the case would seem
rather to be that they were carried away by the spirit
of the age, and used their rationalism to condone
their own superstition.
The great defect in the religious revival of the
third century was its utter lack of the spirit of criticism \
1 Reville, p. 130.
l6 ROMAN RELIGION IN [l
It is true that this uncritical spirit was not limited to
that particular age, nor was it found among the
heathen alone. Thus Tacitus1 among men of an
earlier generation, and Clement of Rome2 and
Tertullian3 among the Christians, were as ready to
accept the legend of the Phoenix as Celsus4 or
Philostratus5. But in the third century the tide of ill-
regulated religious feeling produced a flood of super-
stition against which men of the keenest intellect
found it well nigh impossible to stand. It is hard, on
any other supposition, to explain how so many of
the great Neoplatonists could become upholders of
astrology and magic, and declare that these things
had a scientific basis in the influence of the stars and
the mutual relations of the elements.
The whole machinery of augury, prophecy, oracles
and the like was once again called into play, and all
classes of society had recourse to one or other of
these sources for aid and information upon every
conceivable subject. But the most important of these
means of communication with the unseen world were
the various " Mysteries." The existence of such rites
was not a new thing. The Eleusinian Mysteries had
already been long established in the days of Plato,
and the mysteries of the third century belong to the
same general type. The number of deities however
in whose honour they were celebrated, the high value
set upon initiation, and the crowds of persons who
were initiated, often into the mysteries of more than
1 Ann. 6. 28. 2 Ep. i. 25.
3 DeRes. Cam. 13. 4 Or. c. Cels. 4. 98.
5 Vit. Apoll. 3. 49.
I] THE THIRD CENTURY i;
one deity, far surpassed anything that had been known
before.
There is in fact a fundamental difference between
the early Roman conception of religion and that of
the period with which we are now concerned1. The
old Roman religion was barren and cold. The stress
was- laid on formal observances, the whole matter
being neither more nor less than a bargain. In return
for the proper sacrifices paid at the proper time and
in the proper manner the gods were expected to send
certain advantages to the worshipper. But by the
beginning of the third century there had sprung up a
real love for the gods, and a desire for communion
with them. The belief also in a future life was far
more definite than it had been in the Classical period.
The philosophers on the one hand, and the hierophants
of the various mysteries on the other, endeavoured to
set men's minds at rest upon this matter, and both
alike commanded the attention of those whom they
addressed. There arose moreover an idea of holiness
which had been practically unknown before2 ; and
with it an idea not unlike the Christian conception of
sin. It is not the same, for there is no notion of
man's voluntary deviation from the will of God.
But there is the longing for the attainment of a state
of purity, whether by a life of asceticism or by a
series of purifying ceremonies.
One other question remains to be discussed.
What was the attitude of the paganism of this period
towards Christianity? Toleration has already been
mentioned as the leading characteristic of the age,
1 Reville, p. 143. 2 Reville, p. 152.
E. N. 2
1 8 ROMAN RELIGION IN [l
and it is in consequence not surprising to find that,
under the Syrian Emperors, the Church was more free
from persecution than at any other time between the
reigns of Nero and Constantine. But it was difficult
to extend toleration to a religion that was itself
intolerant; and, side by side with the readiness to
abstain from persecution, there are here and there
traces of an almost pathetic anxiety that the Christians
should do their share, and acknowledge that the older
religions, if not actually superior, were at least on the
same level as their own, and worthy of the fullest re-
cognition as partial manifestations of the same deity.
The attitude however of the Church was not
conciliatory. Never perhaps has there been a writer
so uncompromising as Tertullian, and even if, a
generation later, Origen appears to be in sympathy
with much of heathen philosophy, there is no question
as to his position with regard to heathen religion.
Accordingly attempts were made to weld the pagan
systems into a single weapon, which could be used
with effect against the new religion.
The first of these attempts was made during the
supremacy of Julia Domna1. During the reigns of
her husband, Septimius Severus, and of his successor
Caracalla, this remarkable woman exercised an
influence that was considerable even in matters of
politics, whilst in the realm of art and literature her
power was unquestioned. She gathered around her
a literary circle of the best intellects of the age,
recruited from all parts of the Empire, but principally
from Greece and her native Syria. The tone of her
1 Reville, p. 190.
I] THE THIRD CENTURY 19
coterie seems to have been brilliant and witty rather
than scholarly ; the members were men of the type
that feeds on the love of the marvellous, but they were
deficient in the patience needful for deep thought, and
they lacked the courage fully to face the real problems
of life. Their philosophy was Neopythagorean, their
religion vague and comprehensive. They hated
irreligion, and loved variety, and they were moreover
capable of professing doctrines of high purity whilst
leading a life of considerable self-indulgence.
Their great contribution to the defence of pagan-
ism was the life of Apollonius of Tyana, which was
composed at the suggestion of the Empress, written
in the first instance by Damis, and afterwards re-
written and transformed by Philostratus. The subject
of this biography was a real man, who lived at about
the date to which he is here assigned, and in whose
life occurred many of the principal episodes here
described. But the whole has been so interwoven
with legend and fiction that it is well nigh impossible
to disentangle the true from the false. The philo-
sopher of Tyana is in fact transformed into the patron
saint, as it were, of third-century paganism, and the
picture presented to us does not so much represent
what Apollonius actually was, as what Philostratus
would have liked him to be.
On the precise relation between the work of
Philostratus and the Christian Gospels something
will be said later: for the present it is sufficient to
observe that the life and character of Apollonius, as
here described, so far expressed the ideals of the age
for which the book was written, that from being
considered a mere provincial magician or charlatan,
2—2
20 ROMAN RELIGION IN [l
Apollonius suddenly came to be revered by the whole
of pagan society as one who stood on a level with the
noblest spirits of the ancient world. Caracalla1 built
a temple in his. honour : Alexander Severus2 assigned
him a niche in his private chapel, side by side with
Orpheus and Alexander the Great; and later still
Eunapius3 revered him as something more than man.
He is more than the prophet of paganism : he is the
incarnation of its highest hopes and aims.
But, as time went on, it became clear that the
effort had failed. The composite picture of Alexander
constructed by the sophists of the third century was
no more able to hold its own against the Christ of the
Gospels than the disjointed forces of paganism to
prevail against the united strength of the organized
Church, and the heathen revival served only to pave
the way for the coming of the new religion which its
promoters were endeavouring to check.
Two other attempts may be mentioned, both of
which illustrate the desire for recognition from the
Christians to which allusion has already been made.
The first of these need not long detain us4: it was
thoroughly distasteful to many of the people, and its
chief interest lies in the indication which it gives of
the trend of pagan thought towards monotheism.
The Emperor Elagabalus was taken from the temple
at Emesa to be placed on the throne against his will.
He evinced no care whatever for the concerns of the
Empire except in the sphere of religion, and here his
sole object was the glorification of the god of Emesa.
He endeavoured to make the worship of this deity
1 Dio Cass. 77. 18. 2 Lamprid. Alex. Sev. 29.
3 Eun. Vit. Phil. Proem, p. 3. Boiss. 4 Reville, p. 237. •
I] THE THIRD CENTURY 21
the one religion of the Empire, by associating with
El-Gabal the symbols and functions of all the other
gods, and he expressed a hope that even Jews and
Christians might be persuaded to worship the supreme
God in the temple of El-Gabal. But his avowed
contempt for all things Roman made his action odious
to the upper classes : it never really affected the mass
of the people, and its effects disappeared immediately
after his death.
Elagabalus was succeeded by his cousin Alex-
ander Severus, a man of very different type, whose
natural temperament and education alike tended to
give him the fullest sympathy with the old Roman
spirit. He enjoyed intellectual society and showed
the greatest reverence for the old gods, paying weekly
visits to the temples on the Capitol. In his own
private chapel he worshipped a curious assemblage of
famous men. The niches were filled with statues of
Apollonius, Christ, Abraham, Orpheus and Alexander
the Great1 ; whilst a lower order of heroes was also
represented which included the names of Vergil
and Ciceroa. Alexander clearly hoped to solve the
problem of paganism by a religious eclecticism ;
calling into existence a hierarchy of the saints of all
the religions with which he was acquainted. He is
perhaps the noblest instance of the wide tolerance
towards which the comprehensive religion of his time
tended, but there was a certain lack of cohesion about
his schemes, alike in religion and politics, which pre-
vented them from exercising any lasting influence.
1 Lamprid. Alex. Sev. 29. z Ib. 31.
CHAPTER II
EARLIER SYSTEMS OF GREEK PHILOSOPHY
IT will be well in the present chapter to describe
the general state of philosophy in the period im-
mediately preceding the rise of Neoplatonism, and to
point out the earlier sources from which many of the
Neoplatonic doctrines were derived. In order to
secure these two objects it will be best, first to give a
short account of the various stages of Greek philosophy
with which we are here concerned, marking the
appearance of each distinctive point of teaching as it
arises, and then to take a rapid survey of the general
condition of philosophy in the early years of the
third century. No attempt however will be made to
give an exhaustive catalogue of all the great philo-
sophers or even of all the various schools, for such a
list would seem to lie outside the province of the
present essay.
The first school of Greek philosophy occupied
itself with speculations upon the origin and constitu-
tion of the physical world. This primitive Ionian
school, instituted by Thales far back in the seventh
century, continued to exist until late in the fifth
OF
II] EARLIER SYSTEMS OF GREEK PHILOSOPHY 23
century before Christ. The majority of its members
need not detain us. Their aim was to discover the
material out of which the physical world was
fashioned, a material which the earlier members of
the school sought in a single primary substance, the
later ones in a number of different elements. At the
same time there may here and there be traced signs
of the beginnings of something more than merely
physical speculation. Thus Heraclitus of Ephesus, in
addition to his famous aphorism on the universal
prevalence of constant change1, also propounded some
sort of teaching on the subject of a Logos*. Heraclitus
recognised no transcendent deity, so that his Logos
must not be in any way associated with the Jewish
conception of the " Word of God3." It is eternal and
self-subsisting, and seems to represent the " rational
self-evolution of the world," the law of progress by
means of constant strife4. The name \6<yo<? was
apparently selected, as being less encumbered with
human and material associations than either 1/01)9 or
We seem here to have the first beginning of the
conception of an universal Reason which occupies so
prominent a position in later philosophy. There is
not sufficient evidence to make clear the details of
Heraclitus' teaching : — whether for instance the Logos
was possessed of consciousness, and again whether it
was identical with the fire which Heraclitus declared
to be the primary substance. It is perhaps most
1 Heracl. /nz£-. 41 ; Ritter and Preller, p. 27.
2 Frag. 2 ; R. P. p. 26.
3 Cf. Drummond, Philo Judaeus I. pp. 34, 46.
4 Heracl. frag. 46; R. P. p. 27. 5 Drummond I. p. 47.
24 EARLIER SYSTEMS OF [ll
probable that the system of Heraclitus was a refined
form of pantheism1, and that his Logos was not
possessed of the consciousness which Plotinus claimed
for his Mind (z/oOs); but it is impossible to speak with
certainty.
Heraclitus is said to have flourished about the
year 500 B.C., and the same date is assigned to the
birth of the only other member of the Ionian school
to whom it is necessary to refer. This was Anaxagoras
of Clazomenae, whose doctrine of the universal Mind
(vov?) so completely overshadowed the speculations
of Heraclitus upon the Logos, that this use of the
term Logos almost disappeared from Greek philo-
sophy, until it was revived five centuries later by
Philo.
This universal Mind of Anaxagoras, whether
strictly immaterial or composed of the subtlest form
of matter, is clearly distinguished from the rest of the
universe. It is conceived as infinite and self-subsisting,
free alike from external mixture and external control2.
It possesses universal knowledge and pervades and
governs all things that have soul. In the original
foundation of the world it plays a smaller part than
might have been expected, appearing only as giving
rise to the first revolution which produced the com-
bination of objects as they are now known to us ; but,
in the organic world, it is the vital principle, in which
plants as well as animals have a share.
The sixth century before Christ witnessed the rise
of two other schools of Greek philosophy, both of
1 Cf. Drummond I. p. 44.
2 Anax. apud Simplic. Phys. 156. 13; R. P. p. 117.
II] GREEK PHILOSOPHY 25
which left their mark upon the system with which we
are concerned. The first of these schools was founded
by Pythagoras1, who laid stress upon the influence of
Number, and who was perhaps the earliest Greek
exponent of the doctrine of transmigration of souls.
The mystical form of his teaching had a great
attraction for the philosophers who immediately
precede the rise of the Neoplatonists and although
there are few traces of his influence in the writings
of Plotinus, yet the lives of Pythagoras composed by
Porphyry and lamblichus, and the abundant references
to him in their other writings, are sufficient evidence
of the esteem in which he was held by the later
Neoplatonists.
The other school of pre-Socratic philosophy to
which reference has been made is that of the Eleatics.
Its principal members were Xenophanes, Parmenides,
Zeno, and Melissus ; and their chief contribution to
philosophy consisted in speculations upon the nature
of Being. They were impressed with the inability of
the human mind adequately to grasp the true nature
of the deity. The protest of Xenophanes against
anthropomorphic conceptions2 of the gods need not
detain us, but a few words may be said with regard to
the positive teaching of the school. In their view the
essence of Being consists in unity and immutability,
and its attributes are described by a series of para-
doxes. It is at once neither finite nor infinite, neither
movable nor immovable ; it had no beginning and it
will have no end3. In addition to this doctrine of
1 Cf. Ueberweg, pp. 42 — 49. 2 Xenophanes, frag. 6; R. P. p. 79.
3 De Melisso, 977 b; R. P. p. 85.
26 EARLIER SYSTEMS OF [ll
Being, the Eleatics also asserted what may perhaps
best be called the positive non-existence of Non-
Being1, the dark principle which lies at the root of all
the changing phenomena of the world in which we
live.
There are but few direct references to the Eleatic
school in the writings of the Neoplatonists, though
Plotinus twice mentions Parmenides with respect2,
but the indirect influence which they exerted was
very considerable. If it is in the writings of Heraclitus
and Anaxagoras that we have to look for the first
speculations upon Mind, it is in those of the Eleatics
that we find the germ of Plotinus' teaching about
"The Good."
The next name that arrests our attention is that
of Socrates. Of the vast influence exercised by this
philosopher over the whole of subsequent Greek
thought there can be no doubt, but it was an influence
due rather to the methods which he employed than
to the actual details of his teaching. Like Ammonius
Saccas the founder of the Neoplatonic school, Socrates
was not a writer ; and it is moreover necessary to
distinguish his authentic teaching from that which is
merely put in his mouth by Plato. In Xenophon's
Memorabilia however we are fortunate enough to
possess materials which are free from Platonic
influence, and from a comparison of the two portraits
the following particulars may be gleaned. Socrates
appears to have been the first thinker to introduce the
doctrine of a divine purpose in creation3. The world
3 Cf. Plat. Soph. 237 a; R. P. p. 90.
2 Plot. Enn. 5. i. 8, 6. 6. 18. 3 Drummond I. p. 52 ff.
II] GREEK PHILOSOPHY 2/
has been designed by the gods for the use of man, to
whose needs many ordinances are clearly subservient1.
Thus man derives advantage from the alternation of
day and night, from the existence of the lower
animals and of fire ; whilst the gods' special care for
him is manifest in the gifts of human intellect and
ingenuity, as well as in the provision of oracles for
his guidance. The precise relation between the divine
and the human is less clearly expressed. The human
soul is said to partake of the divine nature, as the
body partakes of the physical elements2. But Socrates
is here involved in the difficulty which Anaxagoras
had felt before him3. He regards the deity as
personal — believing perhaps in one supreme God with
a number of inferior and local deities beneath him —
and at the same time he holds that man's soul is a
part of God. To this problem he has no satisfactory
answer to give ; but the perception of the difficulty is
the first step towards its solution, and the participation
of man in the divine nature explains and justifies his
endeavour to know God.
From Socrates we pass on to his great disciple
whose philosophy Plotinus and his school professed
to revive and develope. The great addition made by
Plato to Greek speculation was his doctrine of Ideas.
These are to us only abstract notions, and yet they
are eternal realities. They are, as it were, the Genii
of the various general notions, exempt from all space
limitations, but capable of motion, possessed of life
and intelligence, belonging to a world of real being4.
1 Xen. Mem. 4. 3. 3 — 10. 2 Ib. 4. 3. 14.
3 Drummond I. p. 56. 4 Plato, Soph. 248 E; R. P. p. 243.
28 EARLIER SYSTEMS OF [ll
The Ideas are not all on the same level : there are
various ranks to be distinguished among them, and
the highest of all is the Idea of " The Good1."
The universe in which we live falls short of the
perfection of the world of Ideas. It has been created
by the good God in order to express his goodness ;
but fashioned as it is out of indeterminate matter (TO
a.7reipov\ it does not entirely or adequately fulfil that
purpose. There cannot however be more than one
such universe, for this one, despite its imperfections,
is the best that can be made. It is pervaded by a
Soul and is, in fact, a rational being2.
Now the creator is incapable of making anything
that is imperfect. He therefore creates the lesser
deities and points out to them the need of mortal
creatures3. They then proceed to create the bodies,
whilst he creates the souls, one for each star, ready
to be assigned to mortal bodies as need arises. The
soul therefore is divine in origin and in nature : it
exists before the body as well as after it. Like the
soul of the universe, the soul of the individual forms
a link between the world of phenomena and the
Ideas, and even while in the body it has from time to
time flashes of recollection of its former life in the
higher sphere. In the tenth book of the Republic*
there is to be found a doctrine of transmigration of
souls ; but it is not clear how far this is to be taken
seriously, and how far it is only a picturesque addition
to the myth in which it occurs.
1 Plato, Rep. vi. 5080; R. P. p. 251.
2 Plato, Tim. 290; R. P. p. 257.
3 Plato, Tim. 410. Drummond i. p. 66. 4 Rep. x. 617 E.
II] GREEK PHILOSOPHY 29
The schools which professed to be the guardians
of Plato's philosophy, and which are known as the
Old, Middle, and New Academy, need not detain us1.
They do not in any real sense bridge the gulf between
Plato and Plotinus, nor are there many references
to them in the writings of the Neoplatonists. Their
doctrines are often directly opposed to those of the
Neoplatonists, or deal with entirely different subjects.
Thus in the Old Academy Speusippus2 taught that
" The Best," although the first in rank, is the last of
the Ideas in order of development, a doctrine which
Plotinus would never have accepted ; whilst Heraclides
devoted himself to astronomy. Xenocrates3 is said
to have connected the Ideas with numbers, thereby
showing a tendency towards Pythagoreanism such as is
also noticeable in the Neoplatonist lamblichus. The
Middle Academy, alike in its early period under
Arcesilas and in its later one under Carneades, was
almost entirely sceptical in its views ; but in the New
Academy there was a return to more dogmatic
teaching, and Antiochus of Ascalon made an attempt
to combine the teaching of Plato with certain
Aristotelian and Stoic doctrines, which resembles the
eclectic syncretism of the Neoplatonists4.
Of the vast system of Aristotle it is impossible
here to give a detailed account5. His work was
essentially that of a systematizer. He took the great
principles of Plato and endeavoured to show how
1 See Uebenveg, pp. 133 — 136.
2 Arist. Met. xn. 7; R. P. p. 280.
3 Stobaeus, EcL i. 62; R. P. p. 282.
4 Sext. Pyrrh. i. 235; R. P. p. 447.
5 Cf. Crozier, vol. i. p. 54 ff.
30 EARLIER SYSTEMS OF [ll
they could be made to explain the phenomena of the
world around us. In order to do this it was necessary
to define clearly the mutual relations of the Platonic
elements, which Aristotle accordingly considered in
two groups. In the first group he placed "The Good,"
together with the Ideas, which he regarded as being
contained within the mind of The Good, and not, as
Plato had held, as having an independent existence.
In the second group he placed indeterminate matter
(TO aTreipov), and with it the same Ideas as have been
already mentioned in the first group. The next step
was to find the means whereby the lifeless mixture of
Ideas and Matter should become instinct with life,
and this he found in Motion, derived from the Ether
that fills the vault of heaven, whose revolutions enable
the Ideas to unite with the formless matter, and
thereby cause the world to come into being1.
The position of matter in the system of Aristotle
is thus different from that which it occupies in the
writings of Plato. It is no longer a purely negative
principle, but capable of direct union with the Ideas.
In this particular case, Plotinus was led by the
Oriental tendencies of his age to follow Plato, and
indeed to go beyond Plato in his abhorrence of things
material, but in other respects the teaching of
Aristotle had a very real bearing upon the Neoplatonic
system. The incident mentioned by Porphyry2 of
Plotinus' bidding Amelius to reply to Porphyry's
pamphlet on the theme " That things intelligible have
their subsistence outside Intelligence" shows that in
1 Arist. Z><? Caelo I. 3. 270 A; R. P. p. 329.
2 Vit. Plot. 18.
II] GREEK PHILOSOPHY 31
this instance, where Porphyry, and in all probability
his teacher Longinus, followed Plato, Plotinus had
adopted an Aristotelian attitude : and, in the writings
of the later Neoplatonists, commentaries upon the
works of Aristotle and treatises upon his relation to
Plato are of frequent occurrence.
The tendency of Greek philosophy after the time
of Aristotle was to become practical rather than
speculative. The subjects with which the Stoics and
Epicureans occupied themselves were the relations of
philosophy to religion, and above all the quest of that
indifference to things external which alone could arm
the individual with calmness and fortitude under all
circumstances. The Epicureans we may pass over.
Beyond accepting in its entirety the atomic theory of
Democritus, they made no attempt to discover the
final cause of the creation and government of the
world ; and they exercised no influence on the later
systems with which we are concerned. Even the
traces of speculation that still remained among the
Stoics showed that the current of men's thought had
taken a new direction. Their conceptions of the
ultimate principles had become materialised. The
universe was regarded as a living being, endowed
with the highest reason1, and the existence of an
ideal world beyond it was no longer held.
The importance of the Stoics in the history of
philosophy is considerable. When Greek philosophy
was transplanted to Rome, it was Stoicism that found
the new soil most congenial, as the long list of famous
Stoics during the first two centuries of the Empire
1 Diog. vii. 139; R. P. p. 406.
32 EARLIER SYSTEMS OF [ll
bears witness. But the Neoplatonic revival in the
third century was, in reality as well as in name, a
reaction to the earlier system of Plato, and owed
little or nothing to Stoic speculation. Indirectly
however the severe Stoic teaching upon morality
paved the way for the lofty mysticism of Plotinus,
and it is of interest to note that the Stoics were the
first school to develope the system of allegorical
interpretation. Mystical interpretations of special
points had already been given by Demo'critus and by
Metrodorus of Lampsacus1, as well as by some of
the Cynics ; but the method had not before been
systematically applied to the whole field of popular
superstition.
Under the Roman Empire Stoicism continued to
be the dominant philosophical system until the latter
half of the second century of the Christian era. But
before discussing the schools that took its place, we
must turn back for a moment, to trace the rise of a
new stream of speculation, which had begun to
exercise a considerable influence upon the general
current of men's thought. We cannot here enter
fully into the origin either of the Jewish colony at
Alexandria, or of the philosophical school which it
produced. Suffice it to say that the Alexandrian
Jews entered readily into the intellectual life of the
place : they welcomed Greek philosophy as a further
revelation in the light of which the records of the Old
Testament received a new meaning. In particular
the personifications of the Word and Wisdom of God,
which had been described with gradually increasing
1 Drummond I. p. 121.
II] GREEK PHILOSOPHY 33
clearness by the writers of some of the later books of
the Old Testament, now found a counterpart in the
conceptions of Plato and the other Greek philosophers.
These conceptions the Jewish writers developed in the
light of the strong and pure monotheism of their own
religion, and thus gave rise to the Jewish- Alexandrian
school of philosophy. The most distinguished re-
presentative of this school was Philo, whose period of
literary activity seems to have closed about the year
40 A.D. He can hardly be called a great or original
thinker : his system lacks cohesion and is often self-
contradictory : but he is a writer of real importance,
since he marks the first beginnings of a return from
Stoic and Aristotelian teaching towards Platonic
philosophy. It is however correct to say that "Philo
inaugurated Neoplatonism1." Nearly two centuries
had yet to elapse before Plotinus took up the study
of philosophy, and it is difficult to find, between
Philo and Ammonius Saccas, a series of philosophers
sufficiently connected to deserve the name of a school.
He was rather a fore-runner, the effects of whose work
were not immediately visible, though destined in after
years to be of the greatest importance.
The teaching of Philo is mainly given in the form
of comments upon various texts out of the Old
Testament. To this peculiarity of form may in part
be ascribed the inconsistencies and general lack of
cohesion to which allusion has already been made.
By adopting it, Philo deprives himself of the oppor-
tunity for giving a single exposition of his whole
system, and he is moreover led into the habit of
1 Crozier, vol. I. p. 70 and p. 450.
E. N. 3
34 EARLIER SYSTEMS OF [ll
expounding each verse to the best of his ability,
regardless of what he may have said on the same
subject in connexion with another passage.
A few words may be added on the points at
which the teaching of Philo approximates most
closely to that of the Neoplatonists. Foremost
among these stand his conceptions of God, the Logos,
and the Powers. Philo is never tired of asserting the
existence and the unity of God, in opposition to the
views of atheists and polytheists alike. God however
is incomprehensible1. He is one, He is simple, He is
unchangeable, and He is eternal ; but beyond these
somewhat negative attributes, man is unable to
describe Him, and even the patriarchs were ignorant
of His Name. The similarity of this doctrine to
Plotinus' conception of The One is obvious. It would
seem that Philo derived it, not from Plato nor yet
entirely from the Old Testament, but rather from the
Old Testament read in the spirit of Plato.
The mediator between God and Man is the
Logos2. The titles under which He is mentioned
indicate the high position which He held in Philo's
system. He is called the First-born Son of God3, the
Eldest Angel, the Archangel, the Name or the Image
of God, and again, Man in the Image of God. At
the same time it is not easy to determine the precise
conception that Philo wishes to convey. The Logos
is described in one passage as at once the source and
the sum of the Powers ; elsewhere as the intelligible
1 Herriot, Philon lejuif, pp. 206 ff.
2 Herriot, pp. 237 ff.
3 Philo, De Conf. Ling. 28. p. 427 Mang.
II] GREEK PHILOSOPHY 35
world1, the sum of the Angels or of the Ideas and
again as the divine spirit. At one time He seems
to have a distinct personality, at another, merely to
express the relation in which God stands to the world.
The fact is that Philo deals throughout in metaphors
rather than definitions. He has not formed, in his
own mind, a perfectly distinct conception of the
Logos, and the description which he gives is somewhat
confused in consequence.
The same criticism may be passed upon Philo's
account of the Powers2. At one time he seems to
regard them as personified attributes of the Supreme
Being, whether in His aspect of Creator, when we
speak of Him as God, or of Ruler, when we call Him
Lord. At another time he approaches very closely to
the Platonic conception of the Ideas, on the model of
which the world around us was created, whilst in a
third group of passages he identifies the Powers with
the Angels. It may be noticed that Philo seems here
to hover between Platonic and Aristotelian teaching,
and that he anticipates the position adopted by
Plotinus. He follows Plato in assigning an actual
existence to the Ideas, and in speaking of the
intelligible world : but, like Plotinus, he also adopts a
definitely Aristotelian position when he places the
Ideas within the Logos.
With regard to cosmology, Philo accepts the
teaching of Plato3. He explicitly rejects both the
Aristotelian view that this world had no beginning
1 Philo, De Opif. Mundi, 6. p. 5 Mang.
2 Herriot, pp. 241 ff.
3 Herriot, pp. ssoff. ; cf. De Incorrupt. Mundi, 3.
3—2
36 EARLIER SYSTEMS OF [ll
and will have no end, and that of the Stoics, who
believed that the present order of things would one
day be destroyed by fire. He maintains that the
world was created, and thus had a beginning, but that,
once created, it is eternal. He adds moreover1, like
Plato, and for the reasons which Plato adduces, that
there can be no other physical world than that in
which we live. It is in the highest degree improbable
that God would create a world inferior or even similar
to this one, and it is equally clear that if He had been
able to create a better, He would already have done so.
One other point in Philo's teaching demands a
word in passing2. He distinguishes four classes of
''ecstasy." The first is ordinary madness. The second
consists of sudden astonishment such as that with
which Isaac was filled when Esau claimed his blessing.
The third class he describes as the calm state of the
reason which resembles the deep sleep which fell
upon Adam : whilst to the fourth class belongs the
inspiration of the prophets, which Philo himself
professes to have at times experienced. It is to be
remarked that the "ecstasy" of' Plotinus is not
identical with the fourth or highest class, but is more
nearly akin to the third in Philo's series. This
example illustrates the characteristic difference that
runs through the whole systems of Plotinus and
Philo, for the latter never permits himself to be so far
carried away by his philosophy as to forget that he is
a Jew, or to enunciate doctrines inconsistent with his
interpretation of the Old Testament scriptures.
1 Herriot, p. 234.
2 Herriot, p. 194; Quis rer. div. heres sit. 51. 52. p. 509 Mang.
II] GREEK PHILOSOPHY 37
It should be added that Philo is not entirely free
from the Pythagoreanism which contributes so large
a share to the philosophy of the first four centuries
after Christ1. To the modern reader, his mystical
speculations on the subject of number appear to be
meaningless and fantastic, but they are thoroughly
characteristic of the age in which they are written.
Numerical mysticism does not play a prominent part
in the philosophy of Plato, although instances of it
are to be found, but out of those who endeavoured in
after years to revive his teaching, there were few who
succeeded in resisting the attraction which speculation
of this kind seems to have exercised.
Another "fore-runner," who still hardly deserves
the title of Neoplatonist, was Plutarch of Chaeronea.
He too was opposed to Stoic doctrines and drew his
inspiration from the writings of Plato. He held that
there are two first principles2, God and Matter, the
giver and the receiver of form respectively, and
between them, the Ideas, or patterns according to
which the world was made. For Matter, though not
in itself good, is indifferent, and is evil only in so far
as it is permeated by the evil principle which is the
cause of all disorder, and to which Plutarch gives the
title of the World-soul3. The system of Plutarch is
less elaborate and less thorough than that of Plotinus,
though in some respects he directly anticipates the
doctrines of the Neoplatonists. He definitely main-
tains, for example, the existence of both gods and
daemons4, and in his explanation of the " daemon " of
1 Herriot, pp. 261 ff. 2 De Is. et Osir. 45. p. 369; R. P. p. 508.
3 De An. Procr. 5. p. 1014. 4 R. P. p. 510.
38 EARLIER SYSTEMS OF [ll
Socrates, he clearly takes up the position afterwards,
adopted by Plotinus, that the true philosopher should
base his teaching not upon logical deduction but on
direct intuition1.
It only remains to enumerate the chief philosophers
who occur in the century immediately preceding the
appearance of Ammonius Saccas. After the time of
Marcus Aurelius, the popularity of Stoicism declined,
and Neopythagoreanism became the most fashionable
form of philosophy. It was characterized by a love
of numerical speculation and a somewhat vague
mysticism, based on the study of writings, authentic
or spurious, attributed to Pythagoras and his school.
The most illustrious name in this period is that of
Numenius of Apamea, whose famous description of
Plato as the Attic Moses2 illustrates at once his
ignorance of the true character of Plato and Moses
alike, and his desire to illustrate the affinity that
exists between all seekers after truth, to whatever
nationality or religion they may belong. It is how-
ever more important for our present purpose to notice
that Numenius distinguished three gods — the first
subsisting in undisturbed self-contemplation, the
second and third being the creator and the creation
respectively. He also recognised a twofold division
of the human soul, into rational and irrational
elements. Of these, the former contemplates the
deity, whilst the latter renders the soul capable of
union with a material body.
The second century also witnessed the rise of a
1 Cf. Maurice, Moral and Metaphysical Philosophy, p. 284.
2 Suidas; R. P. p. 512; Euseb. Praep. Ev. 9. 6, u. 10.
II] GREEK PHILOSOPHY 39
school of sceptics, of whom Sextus Empiricus was
the most considerable ; and mention must also be
made of Celsus1, the great antagonist of Origen. The
Sceptics however need not detain us, and though
Celsus is said to have been a Platonist, the extant
fragments of his work contain but little constructive
philosophy.
It is scarcely necessary to say more about the
general condition of the world of thought at the
beginning of the third century. There was no
teacher of commanding genius, and no school that
could lay claim to any degree of originality or creative
power. We find on all sides an appeal to antiquity,
which meets us in the realms of religion and philo-
sophy alike, and contributes to the popularity both of
Egyptian worship and of Pythagorean teaching. But
the appeal was shallow and uncritical, and the results
were correspondingly barren. Authority took the
place of argument, and progress was held to consist
in tedious elaboration of detail. Orientalism too
exercised a strange fascination over men's minds.
Philostratus described how Apollonius of Tyana had
journeyed to India, to converse with the Brahmins
and other wise men of the East, and it is probable
that there were others, besides Plotinus, who en-
deavoured to follow his example. Above all, the
spirit of syncretism, whose influence in matters of
religion has already been mentioned, was no less
powerful in the region of philosophy. The aim of
the philosophers was to unite the teachings of all the
1 Cf. Ueberweg, p. -237.
40 EARLIER SYSTEMS OF GREEK PHILOSOPHY [ll
great masters of old ; to reconcile Plato with Stoicism,
Aristotle with Pythagoreanism and by a judicious
combination of these diverse elements, to arrive at a
system which should represent, not the teaching of
this or that school, but the accumulated wisdom of
the human race.
CHAPTER III
THE FIRST BEGINNINGS OF CHRISTIAN
PHILOSOPHY
IN the chapter just concluded it will perhaps
have been noticed that there is no mention of Chris-
tian philosophy. There are the names of Greek
philosophers in abundance : something too will be
found about the Roman and Jewish schools, but of
Christian philosophy as such, nothing has been said.
Hence it will be well, before proceeding to discuss
the system of Plotinus and the history of his school,
to consider briefly what had been the relations
between Christianity and philosophy during the first
two centuries of our era, and what was the state of
things existing at the beginning of the period with
which we are concerned.
Now in the first place, there can be no doubt that
Christian teaching, as set forth in the New Testament,
appealed, and was intended to appeal, not merely
to the poor and ignorant but to men of an intellec-
tual and literary bent. St Paul, when preaching at
Athens, did not hesitate to address himself to the
philosophers, who in their turn, until he excited their
derision by speaking of our Lord's Resurrection, were
42 THE FIRST BEGINNINGS OF [ill
ready enough to give him a hearing. Nor is this
an isolated case. Alike in the writings of St Paul
and in the Epistle to the Hebrews there are many
passages which show that there must have been in
the Early Church a large number of persons interested
in speculations upon the nature and work of Christ,
and capable of following a theological discussion.
Above all, the words of our Lord Himself, as recorded
in St John's Gospel and elsewhere, express truths
that far transcend all the metaphysical teachings of
the Schools.
But then there comes a drop. The difference, in
point of intellectual level, between the books of the
New Testament and those of the Apostolic Fathers,
is extraordinary. The latter deal almost exclusively
with practical matters : where they attempt to give
an allegorical interpretation, the effect is usually
puerile and grotesque. We search in vain for any-
thing approaching the grandeur of the prologue to
St John's Gospel or the opening chapter of the
Epistle to the Hebrews. It is as though the whole
of the philosophical side of Christianity had been
forgotten.
Now it is probable that a variety of causes
contributed to this result1. The age of persecution
had by this time fairly begun. It had become
obvious that persecution was to be the settled policy
of the Roman government towards the Church, and
that fact would of itself tend to make men lay stress
on the practical rather than the philosophical side of
the faith. Again, the death of Philo and the con-
1 Cf. de Faye, CUment cFAlexandrie, pp. T 19 ff.
Ill] CHRISTIAN PHILOSOPHY 43
sequent decay of the Jewish-Alexandrian system
removed one of the greatest incitements to the
development of Christian philosophy. Moreover the
destruction of Jerusalem served to emphasize what
was already becoming obvious, that the main work of
the Church must lie, not in the recovery of the Jews
but in the conversion of the Gentiles : and in this wide
field of action there were preliminary victories to be
won in the sphere of common life before Christianity
could venture to measure swords with the great
schools of heathen thought.
The first attempts to give a philosophical bent to
Christian speculation were not encouraging. They
are to be found in the swarm of Gnostic heresies with
which the Church was compelled to deal in the first
two centuries of her history. One and all, the
Gnostics claimed to be setting forth a form of the
faith truer and more philosophical than that to which
ordinary Christians were accustomed, but they went
astray through failing to grasp what are the funda-
mental truths of Christianity, and what the limits
outside which speculation ceases to be Christian. So
that in one way it is possible that the Gnostics
actually retarded the reconciliation between Church
and School, for the upholders of the true faith may
well have thought it wisest to avoid unnecessary
speculation and to refuse the study of philosophy in
any shape or form.
But this state of things could not last for ever.
Gradually, as time went on, the Church began to
attract men of culture, and by the year 150 A.D. we
find Justin Martyr suggesting that philosophy should
44 THE FIRST BEGINNINGS OF [ill
be regarded as God's revelation to the Greeks, and
claiming for Socrates, Plato and the rest, a position
not unlike that held by Moses and the prophets under
the Jewish dispensation. It is true that the change
did not come in a moment. Tatian, the pupil of
Justin, hates philosophers of all sorts, and Tertullian
makes them responsible for the whole of the Gnostic
heresies. But the words of Justin show that the tide
is already turning, and prepare us for the development
of a new system of speculative Christianity.
Alexandria was the place in which this rapproche-
ment between Christianity and philosophy found the
most congenial soil. It had been from the first one
of the most important centres of literary and intel-
lectual life, and its Museum and libraries, its staff of
Professors and classes of students, indeed the whole
atmosphere of the place encouraged the growth of a
liberal spirit of investigation. It is not surprising
therefore to find at Alexandria a great Catechetical
School, which did not merely provide elementary
instruction for those desirous of admission into the
Church, but formed, as it were, " a denominational
College by the side of a secular University1."
Of the early history of the Catechetical School we
know but little,2. It is probable thattit began on a
small scale, without any official sanction from the
rulers of the Church, and developed gradually as
opportunity arose. We find the school in existence,
soon after the middle of the second century, under
the presidency of Pantaenus3; but our information
1 Bigg, Christian Platonists, p. 42. 2 de Faye, p. 31.
3 Eus. Hist. Eccl. 5. 10.
Ill] CHRISTIAN PHILOSOPHY 45
with regard to it is scanty until we reach the days of
Pantaenus' disciple and successor, the famous Clement
of Alexandria.
It would appear that Clement was born, either
at Athens or at Alexandria, about the year 150 A.D.
In his youth he travelled widely, and he must also
have been one of the best read men of his time : at all
events there is no other Christian writer of the first
three centuries who shows so intimate a knowledge of
Greek literature. Unlike Origen, he was not the son
of Christian parents, but his conversion seems to have
resembled that described in Justin's Dialogue with
Trypho : the desire for a closer contemplation of the
Divine having led him, first to the study of Plato and
Greek philosophy, then to the Old Testament and
the prophets, and lastly to Christ. It was, in fact, an
intellectual rather than a moral conversion, so that
it is not surprising to find that Clement's love for
philosophy is in no way impaired by his profession of
Christianity.
The earliest of his extant works is addressed to
thoughtful pagans1. This is the Protrepticus, or
" Hortatory wonj to the Gentiles," in which Clement
begins by endeavouring to release his reader from
popular superstitions. He deals with Greek myth-
ology, with the public worship of the pagan gods, and
with the Mysteries, and then he proceeds to the
speculations of philosophy. These, attractive as they
are, still create a blank which they cannot entirely
fill. They produce a longing for fuller knowledge,
and for more direct communion with God, which can
1 de Faye, pp. 54 ff.
46 THE FIRST BEGINNINGS OF [ill
be satisfied only by the study of Holy Scripture.
There can be little doubt that this gives a true
picture of Clement's own conversion, and that it
indicates clearly the position which he assigns to
Greek philosophy.
Following on the Protrepticus come the three
books of the Paedagogus or " Tutor1." The Protrep-
ticus sets forth the Logos as the Converter of souls :
the Paedagogus is intended to describe to the new
convert the Logos considered as the Educator of
souls. Clement makes no attempt to set forth a
complete system of education. He indicates a
method, and leaves each individual to formulate his
own scheme. The first book describes the need of a
Paedagogus, the love of Christ for man, and His
methods of dealing with men. In the second and
third books we find descriptions of the vices of
heathen life, and of various forms of wrongdoing
which the Christian must avoid.
It was Clement's intention to write a third treatise
which was to be styled the " Teacher " and was to
contain his system of Christian philosophy. This,
however, was never written, and in its place we have
eight books of Miscellanies, quaintly described as
Stromates or " Clothes-bags." That the Stromates
were not intended to take the place of the Teacher is
made clear by a number of passages in which Clement
speaks of the latter work as still unwritten2. They
are to be regarded rather as preliminary essays
dealing with parts of the subject, and as such they
1 de Faye, pp. 64 ff.
2 e.g. Strom. 7. 59 end.
Ill] CHRISTIAN PHILOSOPHY 47
are by no means devoid of interest. Thus we may
learn from the elaborate apology with which the first
book opens, that the intellectual and speculative
Christians for whom Clement was writing, were, even
at Alexandria, in a minority. Indeed, so great was
the number of those who shared the view that
philosophy and Greek culture were apt to lead men
to heresy and unbelief, and that it was therefore best
to leave these things alone, that Clement actually
goes out of his way to defend even the practice of
literary composition. He treats these upholders of a
narrower Christianity with unfailing courtesy and
consideration, endeavouring always to convert rather
than to confute them ; and it is to the credit of both
parties that there was never any open breach between
them.
The aim of Clement of Alexandria was to absorb
into his teaching all that was good in Greek thought,
whilst rejecting all that was bad and worthless. To
reject the whole of Greek philosophy, as the majority
of the early Fathers had done, was becoming in-
creasingly difficult and unwise : to accept good and
bad indiscriminately involved serious risk of running
into Gnostic and other heresies.
It was necessary to find some standard, and the
test which Clement adopted was partly ethical and
partly theological. Thus he rejected Epicureanism
altogether1. A system, based on Atheism, which
taught that pleasure was the guiding principle of life,
won but scant praise from him. Nor did the Stoics
rank high in his estimation ; for did not they teach
1 Protr. 66 end; Strom, i. i.
48 THE FIRST BEGINNINGS OF [ill
that God is a corporeal being1 ? Plato and Pytha-
goras— the Pythagoras not of history but of legend
— are the two philosophers who excite his greatest
admiration ; but he does not confine himself to the
doctrines of any single school. Philosophy, ac-
cording to his definition2 includes all teaching that
conduces to righteousness and sound learning, and he
accepts all teaching to which this definition can be
applied.
t From these diverse elements of philosophy and
Christian doctrine, the theology of Clement was
derived. It remains for us to enquire how far this
theological system was taken over from the philo-
sophers, and to what extent it was the result of purely
Christian influences. Broadly speaking the system of
Clement may be divided into three main sections —
his conception of God, his conception of the Logos,
and his ethical teaching. And in the main, the first
of these sections is largely derived from Plato, the
second from Philo, and the third from Aristotle.
The portions of Plato's philosophy which appealed
most strongly to thinkers of the second and third
centuries were his doctrine of the Ideas and his
conception of God as the Idea of " The Good." This
doctrine Clement accepts and repeatedly emphasizes
in language that is unmistakeable. God, he says3 is
independent of time and space and all physical
limitations. He is not to be described, unless
metaphorically, in anthropomorphic terms4, for God is
not man-like, nor has he need of senses like ours.
1 Strom, i. 51. 2 Strom, i. 37.
3 Strom. 2.. 6. 4 Strom. 4. 153, 7. 37.
Ill] CHRISTIAN PHILOSOPHY 49
Clement even goes beyond the language of Plato and
states1 that God transcends not merely the physical
but even the intelligible world. He is devoid of
passions, and can be defined only as pure Being. At
the same time it must not be thought that Clement's
conception of God is derived exclusively from Platonic
sources. When describing the goodness of God, he
goes far beyond the philosophers, and adds touches
that are unmistakeably Christian, telling us2 that God
does not emit goodness automatically and of necessity,
as a fire emits heat, the process is voluntary and
conscious. We have here escaped from the conception
of God as a mere philosophical abstraction, and
passed to the Christian doctrine of a wise and loving
Father.
It is unnecessary to enter upon a detailed dis-
cussion of the two remaining sections of Clement's
system. His doctrine of the Logos is in great
measure identical with that of Philo : but here too
Clement adds touches which make it plain that he is
describing no mere hypothetical being, but the Word
Who became flesh for the redemption of the world.
And it is the same with his ethical teaching. This is
centred in the person of the true Gnostic3, who is in
many, respects similar to the " Wise Man " of Stoic
tradition. But, even here, Christian Love as well as
Knowledge, forms one of the mainsprings of the
ideal character.
The foregoing account will make sufficiently clear
the attitude of the Christian Church towards the
great schools of Greek thought in the years that
1 Strom. 5. 39. 2 Strom. 7. 42. 3 Strom. 7. i ff.
E. N.
5O FIRST BEGINNINGS OF CHRISTIAN PHILOSOPHY [ill
immediately precede the rise of Neoplatonism. The
vast majority of Christians had little taste for
philosophy, but a minority, small in numbers though
of no mean ability, was endeavouring to claim for
Christianity the fruits of Greek speculation. In a
previous chapter some attempt has been made to
point out what portions of each system were incor-
porated in the teaching of the Neoplatonists. It is
not impossible that the work of Clement was known
to the founders of that School — indeed if there is any
truth in the story that Ammonius Saccas was at one
time a Christian1, it can hardly have been otherwise.
And there are close analogies to be traced in some
points of detail between the doctrines of Clement and
of Plotinus. It may well be, for instance, that
Clement's description of the beatific vision2 influenced
Plotinus in his conception of ecstasy, and that there
is some connexion between the Christian Father's
description of the Holy Trinity8 and that later
enunciated by the great Neoplatonist We may
notice however that such indebtedness is nowhere
acknowledged, indeed if it exists it has been care-
fully concealed, for in the writings of Plotinus there
is not a single reference either to the historical facts
on which the Christian faith rests, or to the theological
speculations that have been based upon them.
1 Porph. apud Eus. Hist. Ecd. 6. 19.
2 Strom. 7. 12, 13. 3 e.g. Strom. 4. 158.
CHAPTER IV
THE HISTORY OF NEOPLATONISM
IN the foregoing pages an attempt has been made
to give a general sketch of the prevailing conditions
of thought, alike in religion and philosophy, in the
period immediately preceding the first appearance of
Neoplatonism. In the present chapter it is proposed
to give a brief account of the external history of the
school, together with the names and dates of the
great leaders of Neoplatonic thought, and the chief
contemporary Christian writers, pointing out the
broad relations between Christianity and philosophy
at each stage of the history. In this way we may
hope to obtain a general impression of the history of
the school, which will serve to place the more
detailed discussions of the various stages in their true
perspective.
The founder of the school was Ammonius Saccas.
Of him and of his teaching we have but little infor-
mation, and of that little, much is by no means certain.
According to Porphyry1 he was born at Alexandria
1 Eus. Hist. EccL 6. 19.
4—2
52 THE HISTORY OF NEOPLATONISM [IV
of Christian parents : he was himself a Christian in
his younger days, but afterwards reverted to paganism.
This account is quoted by Eusebius, who proceeds
to say that the story of his apostasy is a fabrication.
The Christian writers do not claim Ammonius as an
ally, but apparently they are anxious to prevent the
apologists of paganism from making capital out of
the story that the first great Neoplatonist had been
converted from Christianity to the purer faith of his
pagan fellow-countrymen1. His second name is said
to be an abbreviated form of Saccophorus and to be
derived from the fact that for some time he made
his living as a porter. The dates of his birth and
death are both unknown, but he must have begun
lecturing in or before 231 A.D., since in that year
his lectures were attended by Plotinus2, the most
illustrious of his pupils. The other disciples of
Ammonius whose names have been preserved, include
Longinus, the rhetorician long supposed to be the
author of the treatise De . Sublimitate, the great
Christian writer Origenes Adamantius, besides another
Origenes, and Herennius, of whom nothing further is
known. Like Socrates in earlier days, Ammonius
wrote no books ; and there is even a story that he
forbade his pupils to divulge his teaching. It is
therefore difficult to form an opinion upon his merits
as a philosopher, since we cannot say how far the
doctrines of Plotinus were new, and how far derived
from his master.
1 Maurice, Moral and Metaphysical Philosophy, p. 316.
2 Porph. Vit. Plot. 3.
IV] THE HISTORY OF NEOPLATONISM 53
i
Plotinus succeeded him as the head of the new
school. With regard to this philosopher we have a
considerable amount of information, since, in addition
to a series of fifty-four treatises from his pen, we
possess a memoir of him written by Porphyry, his
favourite disciple and literary executor. From this
document and from the notices in Eunapius, Vitae
Philosophorum, we gather the following facts. He
was born at Lycopolis in Egypt, about the year
203 A.D.1 and he commenced the study of philosophy
at the age of 28. After attending the lectures of
Ammonius for eleven years, he joined Gordianus'
expedition to the East in the year 242, hoping thereby
to be able to study the philosophy of Persia. The
expedition however was a failure. Gordianus was
killed, and Plotinus, after barely escaping with his
life, made his way first to Antioch, and soon after-
wards to Rome. Herennius and Origenes had
already broken the compact to reveal none of their
master's teaching : and finally Plotinus, feeling him-
self no longer bound to observe it, began to frame his
discourses on the lectures of Ammonius. Following
the example however of his master, he delivered his
teaching solely in an oral form until the year 262 A.D.2,
when he was persuaded to write twenty-one treatises
for private circulation, and in the next six years he
wrote twenty-four more. Nine more were written
before his death in 269 A.D., and the whole series of
fifty-four treatises was subsequently arranged and
1 Vit. Plot, 2, 3; Suidas, Plotinus. * Vit. Plot. 4—6.
54 THE HISTORY OF NEOPLATONISM [IV
edited by Porphyry, forming the six Enneads which
we still possess.
His system1 has for its object the search for the
first principles of the universe, and aims at a syste-
matic exposition of the origin and nature of the world :
whilst, side by side with this, comes his practical aim,
to enable each individual man to rise to the highest
development of his nature, and so to proceed ulti-
mately to immediate union with "the divine." His
method is eclectic: indeed there is hardly a branch of
Greek or Roman speculation, from which he does
not levy some contribution. His teaching however
is no mere re-statement of current philosophy : it is
a return to the original doctrines of Plato. At the
same time these are read in the spirit of the age, so
that while some elements are neglected, others are
sometimes pressed further towards their logical
conclusions than in the dialogues of Plato himself.
It is to be noticed that Plotinus does not attempt
to establish his fundamental doctrines by argument.
The highest knowledge, according to his view, is
attained not through logical deduction but by pure
* intuition : and he therefore enunciates his system
t without any endeavour to prove it. In so doing he is
< merely following the fashion of his time. The great
popularity of " Mysteries," to which reference has
already been made, is an indication of men's readiness
to accept mystical teaching about the future state of
the soul, upon the bare authority of their instructors ;
and although there is no evidence that Plotinus
encouraged attendance at such rites, it may well be
1 Cf. Whittaker, The Neoplatonists , c. v.
IV] THE HISTORY OF NEOPLATONISM 55
that the form in which his teaching has come down to
us, was affected by the prevalence of such "Mysteries"
and by the spirit of obedience to authority which it
indicates. It is however to be remembered that
Plotinus was a speaker rather than a writer, and it is
possible that in his lectures he may have adduced
arguments which he did not include in his written
works.
The system revolves about the idea of a threefold
principle, which appears alike in the universe around
us and in our own human nature. The Deity Him-
self is threefold, the second principle emanating from
the first and the third from the second. The first
principle1 is variously styled TO ov, TO dyaQov, TO ev, —
essential Existence, Goodness, Unity : the second is
Z/OT)?, or Universal Mind2, the creative principle of the
world of Ideas, whilst the third is ^vyr) the World-
soul. This like Mind is immaterial, but standing as
it does between Mind and the material world, it has
elected to become disintegrated, and united with the
world of phenomena. The objects created by this
World-soul are themselves souls of various kinds3,
including those of men : and these souls are capable
either of rising to union with their source, or of
sinking to wallow blindly in their material environ-
ment.
\ Below this Trinity comes fyvcns or Nature, still a
creative principle, but on a lower level, as being
directly connected with matter4. Creation is effected,
according to Plotinus, by a process of contemplation.
1 Cf. Enn. 2. 9. i, 5. -2. i. 2 Enn. 5. 9. 6.
3 Enn. 5. 2. 2. 4 Enn. 4. 4. 13.
56 THE HISTORY OF NEOPLATONISM [IV
The Mind contemplates in The One that which is
possible1, and by continual contemplation, yet ever
with fresh difference, it produces all that truly exists,
that is to say the Universe of Ideas. Similarly it is
by contemplation that the Soul creates, but, inas-
much as it contemplates The One, not directly but
through the medium of the Mind, the objects created
by it stand on a lower level than those created by the
Mind. And in like manner Nature gives form to
formless matter, and thus creates the physical world.
Matter is regarded as indestructible, and as
existing before the present world2. Its existence
however is negative rather than positive, for apart
from reason it is formless and barren : indeed, the
forms which matter assumes in the physical world are
in all cases due, not to itself, but to reason. Plotinus
argues3 against those who maintained that Plato's
Matter signified empty space, but he agrees with
most Platonists in holding that neither the beginning
nor the end of the world can be found in time, and
that in this sense the universe is eternal. TheTsoul
of the universe, like the soul of the individual, is
regarded as in some sense bound up with its material
surroundings ; so that, to a certain extent, it is in a
real sense subject to Necessity or Destiny. Rational
action however is always from within, so that virtue
is always free4. The object of the World-soul is so to
pervade this universe as to bring all the parts into
harmony. But in practice we find discord, resulting
in constant change, and the absence of all except
1 Enn. 5. 9. 6. 2 Enn. 2. 4. 5. 3 Enn. 2. 4. u.
i. i. 10.
1 Enn. 5. 9. 6. » Ei
4 Whittaker, p. 78 ; Enn. 3.
IV] THE HISTORY OF NEOPLATONISM 57
mere illusory existence. Men seek for the Good and
cannot attain to it, and therefore they become unjust.
Evil is a lack of the Good ; and, in a universe of
separate existences, the presence of good in one place
implies its absence in another1. Now if the presence
of evil in the world be admitted, its prevalence is not
difficult to explain. The world is not perfect : it is
a mixed universe, and most of the souls which it
contains are neither very good nor very bad, but
occupy an intermediate position. Nor is it difficult
to explain the apparent success of bad men. This
is partly due to the inertness of their victims, who
deserve to suffer for not attempting to resist their
attacks, and it is in part explained by the fact that
the wicked are thus led on to reap their own punish-
ment, alike in their moral degradation during their
present life, and in its consequences hereafter2.
But the problem of the cause of the existence of
evil is not affected by these considerations, and the
solution which Plotinus offers is perhaps the weakest
point in his system. He professes to reject all
Gnostic views of the essential inherence of evil in
Matter, and to believe in a single supreme deity, at
once omnipotent and benevolent. But, when pressed
to explain the existence of evil, he is driven to take
refuge in Gnostic dualism and Gnostic hatred of
things material. The reason that he gives is, that
the universe rests on a substratum of matter3, the
dark principle, incapable of producing anything
beyond itself, and therefore incapable of adequately
expressing the Good. We may notice that Plotinus'
1 Whittaker, p. 79. 2 Whittaker, p. 80. 3 Enn. i. 8. 7.
58 THE HISTORY OF NEOPLATONISM [IV
refusal to allow his portrait to be painted1, and the
shame which he professed to feel at being in the body,
are illustrations of the same feeling.
In his psychology Plotinus still adheres to a
threefold principle. Man possesses Spirit, Soul, and
Body, and thus he has three states of consciousness
which correspond to the three spheres of being in the
universe. Nor is it surprising to find that the virtues
fall into three classes2, corresponding to the three
spheres of existence. In the lowest class are the
" political virtues," which are necessary for all men,
their aim being the avoidance of evil. In the second
class, to which the philosopher alone can attain, are
the " cathartic virtues," whose aim is the destruction
of the passions3. The third and highest form of
virtue lies in mystical union with The One. This is
what Plotinus calls Ecstasy, and it is not a faculty,
nor yet a habit, but a state of the soul, to which
however man can hope to attain but seldom whilst he
is in the body4. That Plotinus did believe in the
possibility of effecting such union even on earth,
there is no doubt ; for we have Porphyry's statement5
that he had himself attained to it once, in his sixty-
eighth year, and that Plotinus, during the seven years
of Porphyry's friendship with him, enjoyed it four
times. This teaching about ecstasy carries us beyond
the realm of philosophy into that of pure mysticism.
At the same time it is not without its philosophical
basis. Plotinus accepted in its entirety the Platonic
doctrine of reminiscence, and the state of ecstasy is
1 Porph. Vit. Plot. i. 2 Whittaker, p. 94.
3 Enn. i. 2. 4. 4 Enn. 6. 9. n. 5 Vit. Plot. 23.
IV] THE HISTORY OF NEOPLATONISM 59
neither more nor less than the temporary realisation
of the longing which the spirit feels for its return into
the world of Ideas.
Such in brief outline is the system of Plotinus.
It is clearer and more definite than any that the
Neopythagoreans could offer, and the lofty morality
to which it leads commands our respect. It derives
an added stateliness from the haughty refusal of
Plotinus to be drawn into mere recriminations against
the upholders of other systems : indeed, it would seem
from Porphyry's account that he preferred to leave to
his pupils the task of refuting antagonists, as being
unworthy of his own attention. At all events it is
noticeable that, out of the fifty-four treatises which he
wrote, there is but one1 which is definitely controversial
in character, and this is hardly an exception, since it
consists for the most part of a dignified recapitulation
of his own views, in the expectation that this alone
will be sufficient to refute those of his opponents.
In life and character Plotinus seems to have
exercised a peculiar attraction over those with whom
he came in contact : it is to be noticed that their
enemies do not venture to bring any charge against
the personal integrity of either Plotinus or Porphyry:
whilst both his generosity and his business capacity
are illustrated by his readiness, when need arose, to
undertake the guardianship of his friends' children,
and by his skilful administration of their property.
We are told that he almost succeeded in persuading
the Emperor Gallienus to rebuild one of the ruined
cities of Campania, and to permit him to have it
1 Enn. 2. 9.
60 THE HISTORY OF NEOPLATONISM [IV
governed on Platonic principles1. That he was not
entirely free from the superstitions of his time is
shown by the story2 of Olympius' attempt to compass
his destruction by means of the stars. The attempt
failed, but Plotinus admitted that it had nevertheless
caused him some discomfort.
During the latter part of his life he suffered from an
internal malady, for which he refused to undergo any
regular medical treatment. He submitted however to
massage at the hands of his attendants, who prevented
the malady from increasing ; but at length, losing
their services in a time of pestilence, he grew worse,
and died3.
ii
The new leader of the Neoplatonic school was a
man of Tyrian descent, born in the year 233 A.D.
His original name was Melek or Malchus ; and this
title swas occasionally applied to him throughout his
life. He was however more commonly known by
one or other of two Greek translations of his Tyrian
name — Basileus or Porphyrius4. Porphyry was ac-
quainted in his younger days with the Christian
Origen5, and, after studying at Athens under Longinus
and Apollonius, he came to Rome in 262 A.D., where
he met Plotinus, and after a short period of opposi-
tion became his most enthusiastic disciple6. At the
end of six years he found himself suffering from
melancholy, and seemed to be in danger of losing
his reason : but, adopting the advice of Plotinus, he
1 Vit. Plot. 11. 2 Vit. Plot. 10. 3 Vit. Plot. 2.
4 Vit. Plot. 17. 5 Eus. Hist. Eccl. 6. 19. 6 Vit. Plot. 18.
IV] THE HISTORY OF NEOPLATONISM 6 1
sought relief in foreign travel, and lived for some time
in Sicily1. Of the details of his later life we know
but little : he returned to Rome, where, perhaps as
late as 302 A.D. he married Marcella, a Roman lady,
and the widow of a friend2. Ten months later he
went abroad on what he describes as "business
connected with the affairs of the Greeks and the will
of the gods3." It would seem that he died in Rome
in or about the year 305 A.D.
Porphyry was a man of great learning, but of no
striking originality. As the biographer and literary
executor of Plotinus, he made the exposition and
defence of his master's teaching the chief work of his
life. His own additions to Neoplatonism dealt, for
the most part, with the practical bearing of philosophy.
Thus he taught that the cause of evil lies not in the
body but in the soul4, and that the end of all philosophy
is holiness. In fact, if Neoplatonism reached its
highest perfection in metaphysical speculation under
Plotinus, it is Porphyry who marks its highest ethical
development. His extant writings are not numerous.
The Life of Plotinus has already been mentioned,
and his other principal works are a Life of Pythagoras,
a vegetarian treatise in four books " De abstinentia ab
esu animalium" the " Sententiae" containing some of
his expositions of Plotinus, a short tract " de antro
Nympharum" an Introduction to the Categories of
Aristotle ', and two Letters addressed respectively to
Anebon and Marcella.
It was apparently the intention of Porphyry
1 Vit. Plot. 5, 6. 2 Porph. Ad Marc. i.
3 Ad Marc. 4. 4 Ad Marc. 29.
62 THE HISTORY OF NEOPLATONISM [IV
to combine direct opposition to Christianity with
the attitude of superiority to pagan systems which
characterized Plotinus. He wrote an important
treatise against Christianity1, which seems to have
formed one of the most serious literary attacks ever
made upon the Church; but his attitude of superiority
to the popular religion was not always maintained.
There was by this time a growing tendency, especially
in the Syrian school of Neoplatonists, to lay stress
upon magical or " theurgical " practices ; and there
are passages in which Porphyry displays a certain
sympathy with this tendency. He quotes Philo
Byblius2 to prove that the Greek gods were identical
with those of Persia, and he defends the use of images
even to the extent of giving a mystical interpretation
to the materials of which they were made3. But these
passages are the exception rather than the rule. Por-
phyry remains too thoroughly Greek to agree with
the Syrian school in considering theurgical rites to
be of primary importance : and in the letter to
Anebon he makes his protest against them. This
document is addressed to an Egyptian priest, and in
it Porphyry takes up the position of a critic. He
does not question the existence of the gods, but he
wishes to be convinced that men are right in assign-
ing them to special localities, or in supposing that
they are to be propitiated by special forms of
worship. The other side replied by issuing the
famous treatise De Mysteriis, though it is uncertain
1 Eus. Hist. Ecd. 6. 19.
2 Porph. apud Eus. Praep. Evang. r. 10.
3 Porph. apud Eus. Praep. Evang. 3.7.
IV] THE HISTORY OF NEOPLATONISM 63
whether this work was known to Porphyry or pub-
lished only after his death. In any case the book is
definitely styled a reply to Porphyry's letter, and it
may almost be considered the official apology of the
Neoplatonists for their defence, not merely of paganism
in general, but of the actual forms of worship then in
vogue.
The writer professes to be an Egyptian priest1,
but there is no doubt that he is a Greek and more-
over a Neoplatonist. He betrays his Greek origin
both by his general style and by definite references
to sundry points of Greek literature with which a
foreigner would hardly be acquainted. His tone of
authority is in keeping, not only with his assumed
character of Egyptian priest, but also with his position
as defender of ritual and mysticism as parts of a
divine revelation. The range of topics with which
he proposes to deal is startling — Theology and
Theurgy, Philosophy, Ethics, and Teleology — but it
shows what a variety of subjects had by this time
been grouped together under the general head of
Neoplatonism.
We cannot here follow the writer in detail, as
point by point he discusses Porphyry's letter and
parries or refutes one after another of his contentions.
His main positions are these. Like Plotinus he holds
that the existence of the gods is not in the ordinary
sense an object of knowledge, capable of being proved
or disproved by logical methods, and of being grasped
by the rational faculty2. It is rather a matter of
1 Cf. Maurice, Moral and Metaphysical Philosophy, pp. 333 ff.
2 De Mysteriis, i . 3.
64 THE HISTORY OF NEOPLATONISM [IV
which all men have an innate and indefinable con-
sciousness, so that the most that argument and reason
can do is to distinguish between the various orders of
the gods. They are not to be called corporeal, though
their essence permeates all physical nature1. Nor have
they any need of our sacrifices and prayers, though
these have a real value for men, as links of communi-
cation with the divine2. Now we must offer prayers
and sacrifices to the lower divinities because, although
worship of The One is infinitely higher and nobler,
yet the possibility of attaining to such worship comes
to very few and even to them it comes but late in
life3. Moreover, the lower deities are affected by
prayers, and even by threats, provided that these are
uttered not by mere laymen but by duly qualified
priests4. Lastly, it must be remembered that the
theurgist is moved by the highest and purest of
aims : his constant endeavour is to raise man step
by step from his natural state of degradation, till at
length he attains to union with the eternal5.
This then is the argument brought forward in
defence of polytheism and mystical ritual, and it
illustrates at once the strength and the weakness of
Neoplatonism. It shows how Neoplatonism, when no
longer able to produce a teacher capable of following
in the steps of Plotinus, or even of Porphyry, could
still summon to its aid all that conservatism, which
forms so important a factor in the retardation of any
religious movement ; and how, by affording a quasi-
1 De Myst. i. 8, i. 17. 2 De Myst. i. 12, 5. 10.
3 De Myst. 5. 22. 4 De Myst. 6. 5.
5 De Myst. 10. 5, 6.
IV] THE HISTORY OF NEOPLATONISM 65
philosophical justification to all forms of pagan wor-
ship, it could rally round its standard all who were
interested in the preservation of the old system. On
the other hand the weakness of Neoplatonism is no
less apparent ; for the writer of the De Mysteriis has
to confess that the highest religion is but for the few,
and that with all its boasted comprehensiveness Neo-
platonism still lacked the simple universality of the
Gospel.
iii
With the death of Porphyry the first chapter in
the history of Neoplatonism comes to an end. The
early Alexandrian Neoplatonists disappear, and their
place is taken by the Syrian school to which reference
has already been made. The great representative of
this school is lamblichus, who stands first alike in
time and reputation. His importance is shown both
by the high position which he enjoyed among his
contemporaries and by the respect with which he is
mentioned by Proclus a century later. He developed
the Oriental side of Neoplatonism, his chief additions
being connected with numerical speculations and
mysticism. Thus he elaborated a logical series of
triads and a theory upon the various orders of the
gods. He also made considerable additions to the
system of Plotinus1, inventing a new principle styled
" The One without participation " (TO €v apeOeicTov)
which he declared to be superior to The Good, and
adding further a series of Intellectual, Supramundane,
1 Cf. Erdmann, Hist, of Philosophy, tr. Hough, i. p. 248.
E. N.
5
OF THE ^S
66 THE HISTORY OF NEOPLATONISM [IV
and Mundane deities1, which he made to correspond
respectively to Mind, Soul, and Nature, though superior
to them in each instance. The improvement which
he endeavoured to bring into the system was twofold.
In the first place, there was the refinement which
sought to discover principles whose relation to the
first principles of Plotinus should be the same as
that which exists between the world of ideas and
the world of phenomena ; and in the second he was
clearly anxious to assert the absolute unity of the first
principle whilst retaining the triadic arrangement of
the whole system. He therefore elevated The One
to a position by itself, and completed the trinity of
which Mind and Soul were members by the addition
of Nature. To the modern mind this fantastic elabo-
ration of metaphysical detail is a mark of declining
power, but there is no doubt that it won for lambli-
chus the admiration of the philosophers of his day.
He is also famous for the attention which he paid
to incantations and other theurgical arts. ' It may
however be doubted whether this was not rather
characteristic of the age in which he lived than of
the man himself. lamblichus appears to have lived
on into the reign of Constantine, and to have died
about the year 330 A.D.
A Neoplatonist of a very different stamp from
those who have been described was Hierocles2. He
1 deol voepoL, u7re/)K007«oi,
2 It is customary among modern writers to class Hierocles of
Bithynia with the Neoplatonists, nor have I felt justified in breaking
through this rule. At the same time neither Eusebius, in his reply to
Hierocles' treatise against the Christians, nor Lactantius, appear
definitely to speak of him as a Neoplatonist. His book seems to
IV] THE HISTORY OF NEOPLATONISM 6/
was a man of action rather than a man of thought ;
and his weapons were more frequently those of the
executioner than those of the dialectician. He was
born in Caria about the year 275, and we learn from
an inscription that he was governor of Palmyra under
Diocletian and Maximian. It was perhaps at this
period that he became acquainted with Galerius,
whom he is said to have urged to persecute the
Christians. From Palmyra he was transferred to
Bithynia in the year 304 A.D., and in the following
year he was again removed to Alexandria. His
claim to be considered a Neoplatonist indicates the
extent to which the school had become the recognised
apologists of paganism. His one literary work, of
which the name and a few extracts have been pre-
served, was called " Plain words for the Christians,"
in which, after bringing forward sundry difficulties
and inconsistencies in the Christian scriptures, he
appears to have compared the life and miracles of
Christ with those of Apollonius of Tyana. The book
itself is no longer extant, but we possess a treatise
written in reply to it by Eusebius, who declares that
the scriptural difficulties had already been sufficiently
answered by Origen in his writings against Celsus.
Hierocles showed himself throughout a constant
have consisted of two parts, a series of Biblical questions similar to
those answered by Origen in his writings against Celsus, and an
elaborate attempt to show that Apollonius, the "godlike man" of
paganism, is greater than Jesus, the Christian God. Strictly speaking
therefore, Hierocles should be reckoned a Neopythagorean, but by the
beginning of the fourth century the two schools had so far amalgamated
that we shall not be far wrong in including his name among the
Neoplatonists.
5—2
68 THE HISTORY OF NEOPLATONISM [IV
enemy of the Christians ; and, as governor of
Bithynia, he became notorious for the zeal and
cruelty with which he carried out Diocletian's edicts
for their persecution.
After the death of lamblichus there is a gap in the
line of great Neoplatonists. We hear indeed of Sopater
of Apamea, who was put to death by Constantine on
a charge of employing magic to delay the arrival of
the imperial corn ships ; and the names of Aedesius
of Cappadocia, Maximus of Ephesus, and Eusebius
of Myndus must not be passed over in silence. But
there is no teacher of commanding force who stands
out pre-eminently as the head of the school.
iv
The next name which arrests our attention is that
of the Emperor Julian. More perhaps than almost
any other character in history, he has been the victim
of circumstance. We speak with respect of Celsus
and Porphyry, recognising that, if they were op-
ponents of Christianity, they were nevertheless men
of honesty, who tried by fair and open argument to
justify their preference for the religion of their
ancestors. But of Julian it is difficult to speak with-
out adding the hateful surname of "The Apostate,"
and without regarding him as a traitor, who perse-
cuted the Church and tried to undo the noble work of
Constantine. What that Christianity was which he
forsook, and how far he is to be considered a per-
secutor of the Church, are questions which we do not
often attempt to answer. The relation however of
Julian to the Church will be more properly considered
IV] THE HISTORY OF NEOPLATONISM 69
in the next chapter: we are at present concerned only
with his positive teaching as a representative of the
Neoplatonic school.
As a philosopher, Julian cannot indeed be placed
on the same level as Plotinus, but he is to be regarded
as one who, by example and precept, brought no
discredit on the school of which he was a member.
A follower of lamblichus, he exhibits the defects of
that section of Neoplatonism — a certain lack of clear-
ness of thought and a fondness for mysticism. But it
is an exaggeration to say that " it is in the Emperor
Julian and his philosophic friends that Neoplatonism
goes down to its nadir1." Julian was neither a relent-
less persecutor of the Church, like Hierocles, nor was
he lost, like lamblichus, in tedious elaboration of un-
intelligible speculation. In both of these respects
Julian stands on a higher level than his immediate
predecessors. He cleared away much of the useless
detail with which Neoplatonism had latterly been
encumbered, and if we remember the absolute power
which the Emperor possessed, and the hatred which
Julian undoubtedly felt against the Church, we cannot
but be surprised at the moderation which he dis-
played in the matter of persecution.
Turning to the details of Julian's system, we notice
that he does not explicitly accept Plotinus' trinity of
first principles2. His view of The One is in strict
accordance with that of Plotinus, but he has little to
say about the other members of the trinity, and the
relation in which they stand to The One and to each
1 Diet. Christ. Biog. art. "Julian."
2 Kendall, The Emperor Julian, pp. 74 ff.
7O THE HISTORY OF NEOPLATONISM [IV
other. On the other hand he is more explicit than
Plotinus had been upon the subordinate orders of
being. Not content with the distinction between the
world of Ideas and the world of phenomena, he sub-
divides the former by contrasting the Intelligible with
the Intellectual (TO vorjrov with TO voepov), thus ob-
taining three spheres of being in place of the trinity
of first principles which he neglects. He adopts, in
fact, lamblichus' teaching in its main outlines, but
simplifies it by omitting the constant repetition
whereby lamblichus had endeavoured to convey a
clearer impression of the transcendental purity of his
ultimate principles.
According to Julian, the highest sphere emanates
directly from The One, and is occupied by the in-
telligible gods, chief among whom is the Sun, — not
the visible centre of the solar system, but his ideal
counterpart1. In addition to his position as head of
the intelligible world, the Sun occupies the same
position in reference to the intellectual and phe-
nomenal spheres which The One holds with regard
to the intelligible. The place of honour which Julian
assigns to the Sun is doubtless due to Oriental in-
influence ; and in particular to that of Mithras-
worship. This view is corroborated by the confusion
which Julian permits himself, consciously or uncon-
sciously, to make between the intelligible sun and the
phenomenal. Below the intelligible and intellectual
gods we reach the cosmical sphere, wherein subsist
the lowest order of gods, the various daemons, good
and evil, and the visible world. Matter is regarded
1 Kendall, p. 77.
IV] THE HISTORY OF NEOPLATONISM 71
by Julian with as much aversion as it is by Plotinus ;
unless animated by divine essence it cannot even be
apprehended by sense, and the union between matter
and soul is brought about exclusively for the benefit
of the lower principle.
The system of Julian has been described at
somewhat greater length than its philosophical
importance might seem to warrant, because it repre-
sents the final stage reached by Neoplatonism before
the end of the struggle with Christianity. A century
and three quarters had yet to elapse before Justinian
closed the Neoplatonic schools : but after the time of
Julian no real effort was made to re-convert the world
to paganism. Neoplatonism adopted a more academi-
cal dress : its intimate connexion with pagan myths
and pagan forms of worship was no longer prominent,
and it retired to a position of dignified seclusion, far
removed from all questions of religious controversy.
There is another gap in the history of Neoplatonism
after the death of Julian. The school was not dead,
for it reappears in the early years of the fifth century
both at Athens and at Alexandria ; and there is
moreover positive evidence for its persistence during
the interval at Rome, where St Augustine passed
through a period of attachment to Neoplatonism
before his conversion and baptism in 387 A.D. But
it was in a state of suspended animation. For forty
years there was not a single Neoplatonic philosopher
of the first rank, the chief names of the period being
those of Themistius, Eunapius, and Sallustius the
friend of Julian. Themistius however is eminent
rather as a rhetorician than as a philosopher, and his
/2 THE HISTORY OF NEOPLATONISM [IV
speeches, as well as his paraphrases of Aristotle, are
still extant : whilst the fame of Eunapius rests not
upon his philosophical insight but upon the fact that
he is the biographer of the school. Just as the long
line of Stoics had already been ended by Marcus
Aurelius, so it would almost seem as though Neo-
platonism took half a century to recover from the
strain of assuming the purple in the person of Julian.
V
This period of stagnation was followed by the
great revival of Neoplatonism which marked the
opening years of the fifth century. This revival had
two centres of activity, in the universities of Alex-
andria and Athens. It was essentially academical in
character, so that the writings of the last Neoplatonists
consist mainly of commentaries on the works of Plato
and Aristotle. There was a considerable amount of
inter-communication between the two universities,
and we find more than one of the philosophers of
this period connected with both.
Turning first to the Alexandrian school we are
confronted by two striking figures, both of them
strangely attractive and strangely different from the
various philosophers described above. One is Synesius,
the country gentleman, fond of his books yet no less
fond of sport, ready, when need arose, to take up the
arduous duties of a Christian Bishop, and to wear out
his life on behalf of his people and his country. The
other is his teacher, Hypatia, perhaps the noblest of
those women of culture who grace from time to time
the pages of history, who was brutally murdered by
IV] THE HISTORY OF NEOPLATONISM 73
the ignorant mob of Alexandria, the victim of blind
fanaticism and unproved suspicion.
Of the teaching of Hypatia we know but little :
but it may be gathered from the writings of Synesius
that she followed in the steps of lamblichus. With
regard however to Synesius we are fortunate in
having no lack of materials from which to form our
judgment. His philosophy is rather of the popular
type1. There is a certain vagueness in his expressions
which betrays the hand of the dilettante, a vagueness
that is especially noticeable in his Hymns. In some
respects however he rises far above the Neoplatonism
of the fourth century. He explicitly rejects the
employment of theurgical arts, and, even before his
conversion to Christianity, he has clearly little belief
in the pagan gods. The claim which he made for
philosophical freedom of thought, before he permitted
himself to be consecrated Bishop of Ptolemais, is a
matter which will more properly be discussed in the
next chapter.
One other member of the Alexandrian school
must be mentioned before we leave this part of the
subject. This is Hierocles, who was a pupil of
Plutarch at Athens, but who afterwards taught at
Alexandria. His position is interesting, standing as
he does midway between Christianity and the old
religion2. He softens down the harsher aspects of
paganism, urging men, for example, to universal
charity, and pointing out the efficacy of prayer. It is
interesting too to notice that, in his view, the belief
1 Nicol, Synesius ; pp. 81 ff.
2 Cf. Ueberweg, vol. i. p. 257.
74 THE HISTORY OF NEOPLATONISM [IV
in a future state forms the one argument for morality
in the present life. Many of his doctrines are
identical with those of Origen, — that, for instance, of
the pre-natal existence of the soul — and even where
he is most distinctively Neoplatonist, his expressions
are often very near those of the Alexandrian Fathers.
In his extant works Hierocles does not appear to
make any direct reference to Christianity, but whether
he is to be reckoned as a tacit opponent of the Church,
is not clear.
The leader of the Athenian revival was Plutarch
the son of Nestorius, whose pupil Syrianus was the
teacher of the more famous Proclus. So far as can
be judged from the scanty information which we
possess about him, Plutarch's philosophy was dis-
tinctly Platonic in its tone1. He accepted the trinity
of Plotinus — The One, Mind, and Soul — and moreover
he distinguished the forms immanent in material
things from matter itself. Syrianus on the other
hand set himself the task of bringing the Aristotelian
and Platonic systems into harmony. In his view the
works of Aristotle must be studied as a preparation
for those of Plato. The same endeavour to reconcile
Plato with Aristotle, and indeed to weld the whole of
Greek philosophy into one homogeneous system,
occupied the energies of Proclus. To enter fully into
the details of his teaching would be to trespass
beyond the proper limits of this essay, for the direct
influence which the Athenian school exercised upon
Christianity was but slight. An account however of
Neoplatonism which omitted all reference to the last
1 Cf. Ueberweg, vol. i. pp. 256 ff.
IV] THE HISTORY OF NEOPLATONISM 75
great teacher of the school would be so manifestly
incomplete that it will be best to add a few words on
the system of Proclus as compared with those of his
predecessors.
According to Proclus, all that exists comes into
being through a law of "threefold development1."
Everything has a state of rest (povrj) from which it
issues and to which it returns ; for everything is both
like and unlike that from which it is derived. By the
action of these three, the state of rest, the issuing
forth, and the return, the whole system of the universe
is gradually developed. With Proclus, as with Plo-
tinus, the ultimate principle is The One, which he
defines in language almost identical with that of the
first great Neoplatonic writer. From The One how-
ever proceed a number of Unities (evaSes) which are
gods in the highest sense of the term. Below them
come the three spheres of ideal existence, for Proclus,
not content with the two divisions already distin-
guished by Julian, speaks of the Intelligible, the
Intelligible-Intellectual (TO VQ^TQV a/jua KOI voepov),
and the Intellectual spheres2. From the Intellectual
sphere emanates the Psychical, and below that comes
the material world. In his teaching upon the lower
spheres of existence Proclus follows Plotinus ; but
in the higher flights of his philosophy his system
becomes more intricate even than that of lamblichus.
Proclus is said to have laid the greatest stress upon
the proper performance of mystical ritual, but in his
extant works he does not stand forward, like Julian or
1 Ueberweg, vol. I. p. 257 ; Procl. Inst. Theol. cc. 31—38.
2 Ueberweg, vol. I. p. 258 ; Procl. Plat. Theol. 3. 14.
76 THE HISTORY OF NEOPLATONISM [IV
the writer of the De Mysteriis as the champion of
such observances. He saw that the day for their
official recognition was past, and he felt that to call
public attention to the subject would only bring his
school into discredit and persecution.
Proclus died in 485 A.D. and with him the history
of Neoplatonism practically closes. He was succeeded
by Marinus, whose speculations were chiefly concerned
with the theory of Ideas and with mathematics. One
or two other names also deserve to be mentioned,
such as that of Simplicius of Cilicia, the commentator
on Aristotle, and Boethius, who, by his treatise De
consolatione philosophiae, his translations from Aristotle
and Porphyry, and his commentaries on these and
other philosophical works, formed for western scholars .
their chief link with Greek philosophy until the
revival of Classical studies at the time of the
Renaissance
Neoplatonism continued to be taught until 529 A.D.
when Justinian forbade the delivery of philosophical
lectures at Athens, and confiscated the property of
the Neoplatonic school. The last chapter of the
history is well known. Seven Neoplatonists, including
Simplicius and Damascius the last head of the school,
emigrated to Persia, hoping to find in the East the
Utopia which they had sought in vain at Athens1.
Sadly disappointed they were fain to return, and in
533 A.D. they were permitted to come back to the
Roman Empire, retaining full liberty of belief, though
still forbidden to give lectures, or otherwise to pro-
pagate their doctrines.
1 Agath. Hist. 2. 30; R. P. p. 566.
IV] THE HISTORY OF NEOPLATONISM 77
VI
Whilst reserving for a later chapter all detailed
discussion of the relations between Neoplatonism and
Christianity, it will be convenient at this point to add
a few words about the Christian writers who belong
to the same period as the various leaders of the
school. The principal Greek fathers contemporary
with Plotinus and Porphyry were Origen, Gregory
Thaumaturgus and Methodius. The importance for
our present purpose, of Origen, the pupil of Ammonius
and the instructor of Porphyry, can hardly be over-
rated. His immense grasp of varied knowledge, and
his comprehensive breadth of view, are illustrated by
the description which Gregory Thaumaturgus has left
of the course of instruction which he prescribed for
his pupils.
Origen and his followers had much in common
with the Neoplatonists. Methodius, on the other
hand, was entirely opposed, both to Neoplatonism
and to the Origenistic school of Christian speculation.
He seems to have been a student of Plato, but he
imbibed little of his spirit. He wrote a lengthy reply
to Porphyry's attack on Christianity, but this, like
the work against which it is directed, we no longer
possess. He also wrote more than one treatise
against the teaching of Origen, notably against his
claim that the Resurrection of the body cannot be
interpreted in the sense of a physical resurrection.
For Origen himself we are told that he entertained a
considerable respect, and the fragments of his writings
73 THE HISTORY OF NEOPLATONISM [IV
contain allegorical interpretations of scripture exactly
similar to those of Origen.
Of Cyprian and Minucius Felix, the contemporary
Latin fathers, little need be said. In the dialogue
composed by Minucius Felix, Caecilius, the heathen
representative, does not adopt a Neoplatonist attitude.
On the contrary, his endeavour to refute the doctrine
of the immortality of the soul, and to point out the
greater durability of the material world, is distinctly
opposed to the teaching of the school. Nor need we
linger over the name of Cyprian. There are indeed
traces of considerable philosophical power in his
writings, but he was too much involved in the
practical difficulties connected with the administration
of his See to pay much attention to the philosophical
revival that was taking place in the heathen world.
We pass on to the great Christian father who, like
lamblichus and Hierocles, witnessed the persecution
under Diocletian and the subsequent triumph of
Christianity. Born soon after the year 260 A.D. and
living until 339 A.D. Eusebius of Caesarea forms a
link between the age of Plotinus and the age of Julian.
His position with regard to Neoplatonism is twofold.
Against Neoplatonists as the apologists of paganism
the Christian Bishop wages unceasing war : but with
Neoplatonism as an abstract system of philosophy
Eusebius the scholar has much sympathy.
During the period of the great Arian controversy
the Church was too much distracted by her own
theological difficulties to pay much attention to
philosophical problems outside her pale. A literary
attack on Christianity made by Julian was answered
IV] THE HISTORY OF NEOPLATONISM 79
in later days by Cyril of Alexandria, and there are
traces in the writings of Athanasius which show 'that
the indirect influence of Neoplatonism upon Alex-
andrian thought was still considerable.
In the last three decades of the fourth century
we find the three Cappadocian fathers, Gregory of
Nazianzus, Gregory of Nyssa, and Basil of Caesarea.
As followers of Origen they represent the side of
Christian speculation which is most nearly allied to
Neoplatonism, and their influence tended steadily
towards the absorption by the Church of Neoplatonic
doctrines. To the same period belongs Epiphanius,
who became Bishop of Constantia in Cyprus in
367 A.D. Among the Latin fathers of this generation
there are several whose names ought to be mentioned.
There is Hilary of Poictiers who is noticeable as one
of the earliest supporters of Origen in the west, and
Ambrose, Bishop of Milan, to whose teaching the
conversion of Augustine was largely due. Somewhat
junior to Hilary and Ambrose, but still belonging to
the same period, we find Rufinus the translator of
Origen, and the two great theologians of Western
Christendom, Augustine and Jerome. All three lived
on into the fifth century, and all of them helped to
disseminate the knowledge of Christian Platonism in
the Western Church.
With the school of Antioch, whose golden age
falls in the early years of the fifth century, we are
not greatly concerned. Diodore of Tarsus, Theodore
of Mopsuestia, John Chrysostom, and Theodoret hold
a place of their own among the Fathers of the
Christian Church, but the trend of their thought was
80 THE HISTORY OF NEOPLATONISM [IV
practical rather than philosophical, and they were not
greatly influenced by Neoplatonic writers. In the
same period we find Synesius, Bishop of Ptolemais,
to whom reference has already been made. One
other writer must be mentioned before we close — the
unknown writer who assumed the title of ' Dionysius
the Areopagite/ It will be sufficient at this point
to say that these writings bear clear marks of the
influence of Proclus, and that they appear to have
been composed at the end of the fifth century either
at Edessa or under the influence of the Edessene
school.
We have now traced the main outlines of the
history of Neoplatonism. Its course might almost
be taken as an illustration of the law of triadic
development enunciated by Proclus. We see it first
in the hands of Plotinus, far above all controversy,
extending indeed a distant recognition to the pagan
system then in vogue, but unfettered by the details,
whether of ritual or dogma, which that system
implied. We see it next, issuing forth and differing
more and more widely from its former self, spending
a century in barren controversy and useless persecu-
tion. And lastly we see the Return. Neoplatonism
desists from the struggle, and becomes once more a
lofty system of abstract philosophy, like its first self,
and yet unlike, in that its energies are directed less
to the perfecting of a system than to the criticism and
exegesis of the masterpieces of Plato and Aristotle.
And thus its work continued, for though the circle
directly affected by Neoplatonism in its last stage
was small, yet the influence exerted by the Athenian
IV] THE HISTORY OF NEOPLATONISM 8 1
school was perhaps in the end more important than
that of Neoplatonism at any other period of its
history. Plotinus may have affected the development
of Alexandrian theology ; Julian fought nobly for
the losing cause of paganism, but it was left to
Boethius to store up for future generations the
teaching of his more famous predecessors, and to
keep the torch of philosophy alight through the dark
ages that were to follow.
E. N.
CHAPTER V
THE RELATIONS BETWEEN NEOPLATONISM
AND CHRISTIANITY
THE broad features of the relations between Neo-
platonism and Christianity have been roughly sketched
in the last chapter. There was at first a period of
apparent friendship. Ammonius may or may not
have been a Christian in his youth, but it seems
certain that the Christian Origen attended his lectures,
and moreover that the Neoplatonist Porphyry had at
one time personal dealings with Origen. This early
period of alliance gave place to a second period of
direct antagonism. Porphyry wrote an important
treatise against the Christians, and the next two
generations saw Hierocles the governor of Bithynia
using every means of persecution against the Church,
and Julian endeavouring to re-establish paganism as
the dominant religion of the Empire, whilst the early
years of the fifth century brought the murder of
Hypatia at the hands of the mob at Alexandria.
But before the end of the fourth century there were
already signs of returning friendship between the
philosophers and the theologians. As early as the
year 387 St Augustine had passed through a period
V] NEOPLATONISM AND CHRISTIANITY 83
of attachment to Neoplatonism before his final con-
version to Christianity, and if in 415 Hypatia was put
to death by the ignorant fanatics, her pupil Synesius
had already been elevated to the office of a Christian
Bishop. The period of antagonism was followed by
the absorption of various Neoplatonic principles by
Christian writers such as ' Dionysius the Areopagite/
and the vitality of these principles was evinced cen-
turies later by the appearance of a great teacher like
Joannes Scotus (Erigena), who drew his inspiration
from the study of Neoplatonist writings, and whose
doctrines, if audacious, formed a valuable tonic to the
barren theology of his day.
But it is necessary to enter into a more detailed
discussion of the course of these relations between
Neoplatonism and Christianity, and to trace, as far as
is possible, in what their mutual obligations consisted.
The question has often been discussed, as to the
amount of borrowing that took place between the two
systems in the early period, and the answer given has
usually been that little or no direct borrowing could
be traced, although the indirect influence exercised
by each system upon the other was probably con-
siderable. It is necessary to investigate the nature
and the extent of this indirect influence, and the
traces, if such there be, of direct obligations on either
side.
What then are the facts and probabilities of the
case ? There is a general agreement among modern
writers that in a certain sense the rise of Neoplatonism
was the result of the spread of Christianity. There is
no doubt whatever that from the time of Porphyry to
6—2
84 THE RELATIONS BETWEEN [V
the time of Julian one of the chief objects of the
1 school was the defence and maintenance of the old
' paganism. The question therefore that arises is this :
was this conflict between the philosophers and the
Christian Church a mere accident, or are we to regard
Neoplatonism as being from the outset an attempt to
j reform and centralise the old religion, and to find
some coherent system wherewith to oppose the or-
ganized advance of the new faith ? If the latter view
be correct, if we are to view Neoplatonism as a
deliberate attempt to re-establish paganism on its
own merits, the early stage of its history assumes a
new aspect. Whatever the attitude of Christianity
might be towards Neoplatonism, Neoplatonism was
essentially opposed to Christianity. But it does not
therefore follow that it was the best policy for the
Neoplatonists to denounce their opponents. Another
method was open to them, more diplomatic, and from
their own point of view, more dignified. Denunciation
of the new sect, whether effective or not, at least
implied its recognition : but to pass it over in silence
was more statesmanlike.
In support of the view here suggested, that
Plotinus by his very silence was aiming a blow
against Christianity, it will be worth while to ex-
amine more closely a work to which allusion has
already been made. The Life of Apollonius of Tyana,
written by Philostratus, is an account of an actual
man, the main lines of whose history correspond with
the broad features of this memoir. But the notes of
Damis of Nineveh were so transformed by Philo-
stratus that the resulting picture is not that of the
V] NEOPLATONISM AND CHRISTIANITY 85
historical Apollonius but of the incarnation of the
religious ideal of the Neopythagorean circle by whom
the book was published. In this biography there is
no direct reference to Christianity, but as we read the ^7
work of Philostratus we are again and again struck
by its resemblance to the Christian Gospels1. In the
first place there is a general similarity of outline.
Apollonius is born, mysteriously, at about the same
date as Jesus Christ : after a period of retirement and
preparation, in which he shows a marvellous religious
precocity, we find a period of public ministry followed
by a persecution which corresponds in some sense to
our Lord's Passion ; a species of resurrection, and an
ascension.
There are also numerous analogies in detail.
Apollo's messengers sing at the birth of Apollonius,
just as the angels at Bethlehem hymned the birth of
Christ. Apollonius too has from the first numerous
enemies who are nevertheless unable to harm him :
he is followed by a chosen band of disciples in whose
ranks we find disaffection and even treason. He sets
his face steadily to go to Rome in spite of the warn-
ings of his friends that the Emperor is seeking to kill
him. He is set at nought by the servants of Nero,
just as Jesus was mocked by Herod's soldiers. He is
accused of performing his miracles by magic and
illegal means — a charge precisely similar to that
brought against Christ. Like our Lord, too, Apol-
lonius is represented as having constantly driven out
• daemons by his mere word. It is even possible to
-compare individual miracles on either side. A parallel
1 Reville, La Religion d Rome sous les Sevtres, pp. 227 ff.
86 THE RELATIONS BETWEEN [V
to the devils who entered into the herd of swine is to
be traced in the story of a demoniac at Athens, whose
evil spirit enters into a statue which it overthrows,,
and at Rome there is a resuscitation of a dead child
which is strangely similar to the raising of Jairus*
daughter. Apollonius too appears miraculously to
certain followers after his departure from earth, and
is clearly represented as being then free from the
limitations of material existence.
Nor are the analogies confined to the Gospels.
Just as Jesus appeared to Saul on the way to
Damascus, Apollonius appears miraculously to a
declared adversary whom he converts. Like St
Peter, or St Paul at Philippi, he breaks his bonds,
and like the disciples at Pentecost he has the gift
of tongues.
There is of course a danger of pressing these
analogies too far : indeed there are probably several
cases in which parallels could be adduced from sources,
that are admittedly free from all connexion with the
Gospels1. But the collective weight of the whole
series is considerable, and it is difficult to believe
that the similarity is not due to conscious imitation.
Now it has already been noted that throughout the
whole of Philostratus' work there is no direct reference
to Christianity, and this too can hardly have been
accidental. Is it then unreasonable to suppose that
in the brilliant circle which gathered round the
Empress Julia Domna there were men capable of
devising an attempt to cut away the ground beneath
the feet of the Christians, by re-writing the Christian
1 Reville, p. 230.
V] NEOPLATONISM AND CHRISTIANITY 8/
gospel in the support of paganism, without acknow-
ledgment and without any show of controversy ?
The advantage of such a device is obvious. A
work that claimed to be historical would gain access
in quarters where a controversial treatise would be
debarred. It might be possible to gain for Apol-
lonius some share of reverence even among the
Christians themselves. And if this were the editors'
aim the absence of all reference to Jesus Christ
becomes not only possible but natural. To mention
Him with reverence would not suit their purpose ; to
introduce Him as coming into conflict with Apollonius
and as being by him vanquished, whether in argument
or in wonder working, must inevitably rouse the sus-
picions of those very persons whose antagonism they
were most anxious not to excite.
They accordingly produced an account of a man
whose existence no one could question, and whose
character they portrayed in colours so attractive as to
gain a measure of approbation even from their oppo-
nents. Round his name they grouped a series of
incidents, copied from the Christian Gospels, but with
sufficient alteration to escape the charge of direct
plagiarism. By this means they hoped to secure the
allegiance of many who admired the Christian faith,
but whose conservatism made them anxious to cling
to the old religion, if only it could be shown to hold
its own against the attacks of its opponent. The lack
of all scientific criticism in the modern sense, among
pagans and Christians alike, secured them from de-
tection. The list of authorities quoted by Philostratus
would more than suffice for the acceptance of all the
88 THE RELATIONS BETWEEN [V
miracles here recorded : and, without making their
intention too obvious, it was possible for them to place
in the mouth of Apollonius discourses which tended
steadily to the advancement of pagan conservatism
and pagan tolerance as opposed to the revolutionary
and bigoted teaching of Christianity.
In confirmation of the view here expressed it may
be added, that whether or no it was so intended by
the authors, there can be no doubt that later apolo-
gists of paganism did make use of the Life of
Apollonius in the way that has been described.
Thus in his Plain words for the Christians we find
Hierocles of Bithynia giving a catalogue of the
miracles of Apollonius, and then proceeding "Why
then have I mentioned these events? It is in order
that the reader may compare our reasoned and
weighty judgment of each detail with the vapourings
of the Christians. For we speak of him who has
wrought all these things, not as God, but as a man
divinely gifted ; but they, for the sake of a few paltry
miracles, do not hesitate to call their Jesus God1.'"
The revival promoted by Julia Domna was not
altogether successful. But the spirit which prompted
it survived and reappeared nearly half a century later.
The silence of Plostirms^upon the subject of Chris-
tianity is difficult to explain until we see that it is
deliberate and intentional. In the whole of his pub-
lished writings — for Porphyry makes it clear that he
collected and edited all that he was able to find —
Christianity is not once mentioned by name, and the
most careful search has produced hardly a single
1 Quoted by Eus. c. Hieroc. c. 2 ; Migne, iv. 797.
V] NEOPLATONISM AND CHRISTIANITY 89
instance even of indirect reference1. It is scarcely
possible to ascribe this silence to ignorance : Plotinus
was hardly in his grave before Porphyry published an
attack upon the Church based upon a careful study of
Christian writings and practices, and it is moreover
difficult to suppose that he was entirely unacquainted
with the works of Origen, who had been like himself
a pupil of Ammonius Saccas. Nor can we set his
silence down to an idea that the Christians were not
worthy of his criticism. If he condescended to write
a treatise against the Gnostics2, why did he not deign
to spend a passing thought upon the larger and more
important body of orthodox Christians ?
The very fact that direct reference to Christianity
can nowhere be found, although its indirect influence
seems to be distinctly traceable in Plotinus' system,
points towards intentional concealment of his obliga-
tions on the part of the writer. Indeed, it may even
be said that Plotinus is specially careful to avoid
using Christian terminology where he approaches most
nearly to Qifistian doctrines. Thus it is difficult to
believe that Plotinus' doctrine of Mind (1/01)9) is not
connected with Philo's speculations on the Word
(\0709). In both alike we find the distinctive theory
that the Platonic Ideas, in accordance with which
1 In his book upon Neoplatonism, p. 83, Mr Whittaker quotes
Enn. i. 8. 5 as "one of the two or three very slight possible allusions
in the Enneads to orthodox Christianity."
2 Prof. Bigg in his Bampton Lectures, p. 30, speaks of those against
whom Plotinus wrote as "purely heathen Gnostics." They are, how-
ever, distinctly classed with the Christians by Porphyry (Vil. Plot. c. 16)
and it may be assumed that Plotinus himself placed them in the same
category. For the purposes of my argument the point of importance
lies not in what they were, but in what Plotinus supposed them to be.
9O THE RELATIONS BETWEEN [V
the visible world was formed, are contained in this
principle. Yet Plotinus studiously avoids using the
term Logos as the title of the second principle of
his trinity. Now it is not easy to see why Plotinus,
whilst using Philo's doctrine should thus avoid Philo's
terminology, unless he had some reason for so doing :
and the simplest explanation is that the word Logos
had in his view been so contaminated by Christian
associations that he preferred to avoid it altogether,
and to go back to the term of the old Greek philo-
sophy. His practice throughout suggests that the
adoption by the school of the position of apologists
for the old religion was not a later development, but
an essential characteristic of Neoplatonism. The
method changed as time went on. Plotinus en-
deavoured to secure his aim by haughtily ignoring
the Christians: Porphyry condescended to make a
literary attack upon them : Hierocles would not trust
to literary weapons alone, and supplemented the pen
with the sword : but the attitude of the school re-
mained the same throughout.
If this view be correct: if Neoplatonism was from
the first an endeavour to justify on its own merits the
existence and the supremacy of the old system, it is
not surprising that the search for the direct use of
Christian doctrines by the Neoplatonists has been pro-
ductive of such very scanty results. They naturally
preferred not to parade any obligations to their
opponents under which they might labour : they
sought out from earlier systems of philosophy those
elements which were in keeping with the spirit of
their day, and carefully concealed the principles upon
V] NEOPLATONISM AND CHRISTIANITY QI
which their selection was based. Just as Philostratus
and Julia Domna had corrected and improved the
Gospel story, so Plotinus edited and retouched Chris-
tian theology in the light of Platonic philosophy.
It is then hardly surprising that we can find no
reference to Christianity in the writings of Plotinus.
But if we attack the problem from the other side,
and seek to discover traces of the use of Neoplatonism
by Christian writers, it is possible that better results
may be found. The third century was a period in
which Christian speculation was unusually free, and
the great Alexandrine Fathers had no hesitation
about turning to Christian use the resources of pagan
philosophy. We have already remarked the free use
which Clement of Alexandria makes of the writings
of Plato and Philo : let us now compare the positions
of Plotinus and Origen. In both alike we see an
attempt to reach a plane of philosophical agreement
above all religious controversy, far removed from all
superstition and ritualism, be it Christian or pagan.
Yet their attitudes are perfectly distinct. Origen,
when pressed, is essentially a Christian. He accepts '
with the fullest reverence the Christian scriptures. If
he pleads for freedom to indulge in mystical specula-
tion, he is ready to acknowledge the claim of the
ordinary man to be as truly a member of Christ's
Church as himself; moreover, as a theologian, he
does not often permit his philosophy to appear.
Plotinus on the other hand is essentially a philo-
sopher writing to philosophers. The audience to
92 THE RELATIONS BETWEEN [V
whom he speaks is small and select : in the ordinary
man he takes no interest whatever. Religion in the
popular sense is a subject which he avoids: "the/
gods must come to me, not I to them," was his reply
when Amelius invited him to accompany him to a\
sacrificial feast1, and it exactly expressed his attitude •
to the popular system. He had no great love for
polytheism, but he thought it the most convenient
system for the mass of mankind, and endeavoured to
point out a philosophical basis upon which it might
be supposed to rest.
Turning now to a more detailed comparison of
the doctrines of Plotinus and Origen, we notice in
the first place that a considerable mass of teaching
was common to them both. The main features of
this common teaching, together with the doctrines
added thereto in Christian theology, are admirably
summarized in the Confessions of St Augustine2/
Writing about the Neoplatonist books of which he
was at one time a student, he tells us that he found
in them, not indeed the words, but the substance of
much of the Christology of St Paul and St John,
with, however, serious gaps. The great eternal
verities described in the opening verses of St John's
Gospel he found set forth by the Neoplatonists, but
all that brings the Christian into close personal con-
k tact with the Eternal Son of God was omitted.
" For that before all time and above all time Thy
Only-begotten Son abideth unchangeable and co-
eternal with Thee, and that of His fulness all souls
receive, in order that they may be blessed, and that
1 Porph. Vit. Plot. ro. 2 Aug. Conf. 7. 9.
V] NEOPLATONISM AND CHRISTIANITY 93
by participation of Thy eternal wisdom they may be
renewed in order that they may be wise, — this is
there. But that in due time He died for the ungodly:
that Thou sparedst not Thy only Son, but deliveredst
Him up for all, — this is not there1."
It is much the same with the other great articles
of the Christian faith. The Unity and the Goodness
of God, and even in some sense the three Persons of
the Holy Trinity are doctrines upon which the Neo-
platonist, no less than the Christian theologian, lays
much emphasis. But the love of a heavenly Father
for His children, and the idea that the very highest
of all Beings could be approached by the humblest of
mankind, are thoughts which we find in Christian
writers alone.
In addition to this partial identity of teaching,
there was some similarity in the methods employed
by Origen and the Neoplatonists. For example,
Origen was at one, if not with Plotinus himself, at
least with the general practice of the school, in
attaching the highest importance to the allegorical
method of interpretation. The use of allegorical
interpretation was not new. It had been employed
by many earlier writers, pagan, Jewish, and Christian
alike, and it arose, not from the particular tenets of
any one school, but from the difficulty which in-
evitably arises, when books written in one period
and at one stage of civilisation come to be accepted
as sacred, and invested with special reverence by later
generations whose civilisation is more advanced.
But although the mystical method of interpreta-
1 Aug. Conf. 7. 9. 3, trans. Bigg.
94 THE RELATIONS BETWEEN [V
tion was not peculiar either to Christianity or to
(Neoplatonism, the extent to which it was employed
by both alike calls for at least a passing reference.
The difficulty mentioned above was felt severely by
the early Christians. They had adopted the Old
Testament in its entirety: they gloried in the link
thus obtained with an almost prehistoric antiquity :
but they found themselves in consequence confronted
with difficulties which their enemies were not slow to
turn to account. If the Old Testament was the Word
of God, why did the Christians set aside the whole of
1 the sacrificial enactments of the Law ? If God, in
the Old Testament, be a Being Whose attributes are
* Justice, Mercy, and Goodness, what explanation can
be given of such texts as " I the Lord thy God am a
jealous God, visiting the iniquities of the fathers upon
, the children, unto the third and fourth generation " ;
or again, " There is no evil in the city which the Lord
hath not done1?"
In the same manner, educated heathens were
v brought face to face with problems of a similar kind.
If the various local divinities were all different mani-
festations of the same God, or members of a vast
host, who all owned one supreme deity as their Lord
and Master, how was it that Homer described the Gods
as quarrelling and even fighting one with another ?
The time had not yet come either for the Christian
' to speak of a "progressive revelation," or for the
heathen to work out a theory of the evolution of a
gradually deepening conception of the deity. Ac-
cordingly, both alike took refuge in the allegorical
1 Ex. 20. 5 ; Amos 3. 6; Orig. Philoc. i. 8.
V] NEOPLATONISM AND CHRISTIANITY 95
method of interpretation, and, once introduced, both
alike employed it freely, even in cases where there
was no difficulty to be solved. If Origen's explana-
tion of the water-pots at Cana1 appears to us. to be
far-fetched and unnecessary, Porphyry's account of
the Nymph's Grotto affords a parallel instance on the
other side.
But the resemblance between Plotinus and Origen
is not limited to their general similarity of standpoint
or of method. Definite points of contact, which may
be grouped in three classes, are to be traced in the
positive teaching of both alike. In the first class we ) \
may place the doctrines which are not specially
characteristic of the teaching of either Origen or
Plotinus, the retention of which serves only to in- -
crease the general similarity between the two systems.
In the second class may be placed those instances in
which there is real harmony between them on points .
of importance, whilst the third class contains cases in
which it would appear that the teaching of Origen,
without being identical with that of Plotinus, has
been distinctly influenced by Neoplatonic theories.
We cannot here do more than refer to one or two
examples of each class, but the question is one that
deserves more attention and more detailed study than
it has hitherto received.
An example of the first group may be found in
the view, taken by both alike, that the stars are '
living beings possessed of souls2. Strange as it
1 Philocalia, i. 12.
2 Whittaker, p. 74; Plot. Enn. 4. 4. 22; Westcott, Religious
Thought in the West, p. 229; Origen, De Princ. i. 7. 3, Comm.
in Joh. t. 2, c. 17.
96 THE RELATIONS BETWEEN [V
sounds to modern ears, this doctrine was by no
means new, and as his authority for its truth Origen
refers, not to Greek philosophy nor even to Philo,
but di/ect to the Old Testament1. Instances of this
kind are perhaps of small individual importance, but
they increase the bulk of teaching common to both
systems — a point that must not be lost sight of, if
we are to gain an adequate conception of the relations
between them.
More important however is the second class, of
which two or three examples may be quoted. The
pre-natal existence of the soul is a doctrine which
Origen2 may have derived either from Greek or from
Jewish sources : it is even possible to quote the New
Testament in support of it3. But the theory of the
transmigration of souls is one of those bolder flights
of imagination which are so characteristic of Origen4
and it is moreover in the fullest harmony with Neo-
platonic thought. We may however observe that
wheileas Plotinus5, in a section that recalls the famous
passage in Plato's Republic*, accepts the possibility
of human souls passing into the bodies of lower
animals,
^ Origen explicitly denies that such a thing is
conceivable7. It may be added that in later years
Proclus adopts the same position as the Christian
Fathers, and interprets the story of Er the Armenian
allegorically.
1 Jer. 7. 18; Job 25. 5. 2 Comm. injoh. i. 2, c. 30.
3 S. John 9. 2.
4 Westcott, R. T. W. p. 228; Orig. De Princ. i. 6. 2, 3.
5 Whittaker, p. 96. 6 Enn. 3. 4. 2.
7 De Princ. i. 8. 4.
V] NEOPLATONISM AND CHRISTIANITY 97
Another instance of the same kind is to be found
in the view held by Origen that evil is non-being. In
his exposition of the third verse of St John's Gospel1,
he endeavours to support his interpretation by
adducing a number of passages from both the Old
and the New Testament : but it is obvious that the
conception of evil as " that which is not " is derived,
not from Scripture, but from philosophy. Origen is
careful however to stop short of the view that "that
which is not " is identical with matter, or of allowing
his philosophy to carry him into any form of Gnosticism.
The third group is perhaps the most interesting of
all. We have here to deal, not with direct imitation
or adoption of Neoplatonic theories, but with their
indirect influence upon doctrines essentially Christian,
and to point out how far this influence tended to
prevent the Christian teaching, and how far it served
to bring out more fully its deeper meaning.
There is in Origen's commentary on St John's
Gospel a passage so remarkable as to be worth
inserting in full2. Speaking of the relation between
the Son and the Holy Spirit, Origen says " Perhaps
we may say even this, that in order to be freed from
the bondage of corruption, the creation, and especially
the race of men, needed the incarnation of a blessed
and divine Power which should reform all that was on
the earth : and that this duty fell, as it were, to the
Holy Spirit. But being unable to undertake it, He
made the Saviour His substitute, as being alone able
to endure so great a struggle. And so, while the
1 Comm. injoh. t. 2, c. 13; cf. Plot. Enn. \. 8. 7.
2 torn. 2, cap. n.
E. N. 7
98 THE RELATIONS BETWEEN [V
Father, as Supreme, sends the Son, the Holy Spirit
joins in sending Him and in speeding Him on His way :
promising in due time to descend upon the Son of God,
and to co-operate with Him in the salvation of man-
kind."
The boldness of this conception is astounding, and
it is clear that no orthodox writer could have ventured
a century and a half later to declare one Person of
the Holy Trinity to be thus inferior to another. For
it is to be noticed that although the Holy Spirit joins
in sending the Son and in speeding Him on His way,
He does so in consequence of His own inability to
perform the office which had fallen to Him. We are
not however now concerned with the orthodoxy of
Origen's view, but with the source from which it is
derived, and if we admit that " Origen was deeply
influenced by the new philosophy, which seemed to him
to unveil fresh depths in the Bible1/' the answer to this
question is not far to seek. In the Neoplatonic trinity
the difference between Mind and Soul is accentuated by
the fact that the latter has elected to become united
with the world of phenomena2. Such union could
not but incapacitate soul for the work of redemption,
since it is clear that the redeemer must be free from
the defects and limitations of that which he redeems.
If this explanation be correct, the case is one in
which Origen was led by his Neoplatonist tendencies
into something very like heresy. But the passage passed
unnoticed. The need for defining the relations between
the Persons of the Holy Trinity was not yet felt, and
more than a century had still to elapse before the
doctrine of the Holy Spirit attracted much attention.
1 Westcott, ^. T. W. p. 208. 2 Enn. 5. i. 6.
V] NEOPLATONISM AND CHRISTIANITY 99
It is only fair to add another instance, in which
Origen's view, fiercely opposed during his lifetime
and for many years after his death, is nevertheless
in complete agreement with modern thought.
To the Christian and to the Neoplatonist alike,
the consummation of man's existence is ultimately to
be found in assimilation to God. It is true that this
is not a doctrine which was borrowed by the Church
from the Neoplatonists : on the contrary it is possible
that Neoplatonism was in this matter affected by
Christian influences. But the form in which it was
cast by Origen may be in part due to Neoplatonism1.
Thus we notice the earnest protest which Origen
makes against the extremely literal interpretation
current in his day of the doctrine of the Resurrection
of the Body2. There will be, he says, a resurrection
body, for incorporeity is the prerogative of God alone,
but we have St Paul's authority for saying that it will
differ from our present body alike in form and in
composition as widely as the full grown plant differs
from the seed. And this conception of a body,
differing indeed from that which we now possess but
united to it by the continuance of personality, he
fortifies by a reference to the Many Mansions in our
Father's House3. These are, he maintains, a number
of resting places in a continual upward progress, each
of which throws a flood of light upon the stage
through which the soul has passed, and opens up a
new vision of greater mysteries beyond. So we are
led on to Resurrection, Judgment, Retribution and
1 Grig. De Princ. 2. n. 6. 2 Fragment, De Res. Carnis.
3 St John 14. 2.
7—2
IOO THE RELATIONS BETWEEN [V
final Blessedness, each of which Origen describes in
careful accordance with the words of Scripture.
Thus the Resurrection body, instead of being gross
and material, will be of fine incorruptible texture,
whilst the complete identity of each person will
be preserved. Judgment and Retribution are not
arbitrary acts of a capricious tyrant but the unimpeded
action of divine law and the just severity of a righteous
king ; and the final Blessedness so far from being a
state of indolent repose will be a vision of divine
glory, with an ever growing insight into the infinite
mysteries of the divine counsels.
It is true that there is no Neoplatonic doctrine
that Origen can here be said to have adopted, and in
some particulars he is following in the steps of Clement
of Alexandria. Yet it is difficult to believe that his
insight is wholly unconnected with the teaching of
Plotinus, that " the soul aspires to freedom from the
trammels of matter, and that rising ever to higher
purity it ultimately comes to nothing else except
itself; and thus, not being in any thing else, it is in
nothing save in itself1." In this way, untrammelled by
Neoplatonic dogmas, yet filled with the spirit of
reverent speculation which prompted them, Origen
has succeeded, " by keeping strictly to the Apostolic
language, in anticipating results which we have
hardly yet secured2." In truth it was by no mere
accident that Justinian, who closed the Neoplatonic
school at Athens, was also the Emperor who procured
a formal condemnation of Origen3.
1 Enn. 6. 9. 1 1 . 2 Westcott, R. T. W. p. 244.
3 Ib. p. 22-2.
V] NEOPLATONTSM AND CHRISTIANITY IOI
ii
We cannot however linger over this early period
of alliance, but must pass on to the period of direct
antagonism, inaugurated by Porphyry and closed by
Julian. The struggle thus occupied almost a century,
and the plan of campaign was not always the same.
Each of the great Neoplatonist leaders, Porphyry
and lamblichus, Hierocles and Julian, had his own
characteristic method of dealing with the problem,
and it is our task to describe what these methods
were, and what the resulting attitude of contemporary
Christian writers.
The attitude of Porphyry,alike towards Christianity
and towards the popular religion, has already been
described, together with the treatise in which the
supporters of pagan ritual defended their position.
It will be well to remember that much of the language
there applied to pagan divinities and pagan ceremonies
might with slight modifications be employed with
reference to the more mystical side of Christianity.
Thus Origen, in his Commentary on St Johns Gospel^
had already said that we must rise from practical to
theoretical theology1, and he had moreover in other
points anticipated the writer of the De Mysteriis. He
speaks of the Unity of God and the diversity of His
powers, and adduces scriptural proofs for the existence,
below God, of gods, thrones, " Sabai " and the like2.
In the second book of his Commentary he elaborates
his system yet further3. The highest being is Absolute
1 Orig. Com in. in Joh. torn, i, cap. 16 2 Ib. c. 31.
3 cc. 2, 3.
IO2 THE RELATIONS BETWEEN [V
God (6 0eo9, or aurotfeo?) ; after Whom come
successively the Word (0eo9, without the article, or
6 Xo7o?), the various Images of God, represented by
the sun, moon and stars, and lastly the beings who
are gods in name but not in reality. Corresponding
to these orders of beings we find a variety of religions.
In the lowest class are the worshippers of daemons
or idols : in the next, those who worship the powers
of nature, but are yet free from idol-worship : above
them come the ordinary Christians who " know nothing
save Jesus Christ and Him crucified," who are, that
is, incapable of rising from the adoration of the
Incarnate Word to that of the Eternal ; whilst the
highest class consists of the favoured few to whom
the Word of God has come, and who are capable of
worshipping God alone, without the mediation even
of the Incarnate Son.
These classes of worship are described as though
they were definitely crystallized forms of religion.
Origen makes it clear however that they are also
stages in men's religious education ; that men can
and do pass from one to another of them, and that,
in order to reach the highest form of worship, each
individual must pass through one at least of the lower.
To this highest class none but the highest spirits can
attain during this present life, but Origen clearly
believes that in some future state of existence all men
will ultimately be brought into complete communion
with God. The whole of his teaching upon this
subject is closely allied to that of Philo, who maintains
that astronomy has played an important part in the
religious education of mankind.
V] NEOPLATONISM AND CHRISTIANITY IO3
It may of course be said that Origen's philosophy
is as essentially a philosophy of the few as that of
Plotinus himself. That is in a sense true, for the
inner circle to whom his mystical teaching is addressed
can never have been large. At the same time there
is a difference between Origen and Plotinus, for
whereas the latter addresses himself solely to philo-
sophers, Origen never entirely loses sight of the
needs of the ordinary Christian. He usually inserts
a simple exposition of each text for the benefit of
the "man in the congregation1" before entering upon
the more imaginative speculation which he considers
necessary for the full interpretation of scripture.
The De Mysteriis marks the second stage of the
struggle between Church and School. In this stage
the plan adopted was not that of attacking the new
system, but of strengthening the old. Between
Porphyry and Hierocles we hear of no Neoplatonist
who wrote against the Christians, the energies of the
school were devoted rather to the defence and elabora-
tion of theurgical practices.
The next writer of importance with whom we
have to deal is Eusebius. His twofold relation to
Neoplatonism has been mentioned above, so that we
need not here do more than refer to passages iri his
works which bear out what has already been said.
The references to Porphyry in the Ecclesiastical
History'2' give us Eusebius' estimate of him as the
opponent of Christianity, who employs abuse instead
of argument, and falsifies the story of Ammonius
1 6 e/CK\?7(ria<m/cos, cf. torn. 6, c. n ; torn. 13, c. 44.
2 Eus. Hist. EccL 6. 19.
IO4 THE RELATIONS BETWEEN [V
Saccas in order to prove the superior attractions of
paganism. In the earlier books of the Praeparatio
Evangelical we find Eusebius criticizing Porphyry as
the apologist of paganism ; pouring contempt on his
justification of the use of images, or on his endeavour
to account for the existence of the world by means
of deities who are themselves dependent upon this
world for their very existence.
On the other hand, when dealing with Neoplatonism
apart from questions of religious controversy, Eusebius
shows a distinct sympathy for the teaching of the
school. Of this sympathy one or two examples will
here suffice, although it would not be difficult to
increase the number. The opening chapter of the
Praeparatio Evangelica has about it an undoubted
ring of Neoplatonism. Eusebius describes the bless-
ings promised by the Gospel as including " all that
is dear to the souls that are possessed of intellectual
being," whilst his definition of the true piety, and his
reference to the Word sent like a ray of dazzling
light from God recall to our minds the phraseology
of Plotinus2. In the later books the indications of
sympathy are yet more marked. He speaks for in-
stance of the Platonists as foreshadowing the doctrine
of the Holy Trinity3, and quotes Plotinus upon the
\ immortality of the soul4.
Before passing on to the Emperor Julian, a word
must be said about the attitude of Athanasius towards
Neoplatonism. Into the larger question of the Arian
1 Eus. Praep. Evang. 3. 7, 3. 9, 3. 4.
2 Ib. i. i. 3 Ib. ii. 20, p. 541 d.
4 Ib. 15. 10, p. 8nb.
V] NEOPLATONISM AND CHRISTIANITY IO5
controversy we cannot enter : we can only note in
passing that the point at issue was no mere theological
quibble : it was the question, whether in spite of the
victory of Christianity over paganism, a new poly-
theism was yet to be allowed to crush the life out
of Christian teaching, or whether the Church was
strong enough to bear the strain of finding her ranks
suddenly swelled by throngs of new converts each of
whom brought with him a certain residuum of pagan
ideas1. The influence of Neoplatonism upon the
course of the controversy seems to have been less
than we might have expected : it does not appear
that the Arians as a party made use of Neoplatonic
doctrines, or that, even at the height of the controversy
the orthodox party broke away from all contact with
the school.
In his Oration against the Gentiles Athanasius
speaks in terms which remind us of Origen or
Eusebius, so completely does he reproduce in Christian
form the teaching of Plotinus. The following may
serve for an example2, " for when the reason of man
doth not converse with bodies, then hath it not any
mixture of the desire which comes from these, but is
wholly at one with itself, as it was at the beginning.
Then, passing through sensible and human things it
becomes raised up, and beholding the Word, sees in
Him also the Father of the Word, delights itself with
the contemplation of Him, and continually renews itself
afresh with the longing after Him : even as the Holy
Scriptures say that man (who in the Hebrew tongue
1 Cf. Maurice, Moral and Metaphysical Philosophy, p. 352.
2 I quote from Maurice, p. 349.
106 THE RELATIONS BETWEEN [V
was called Adam) with unashamed boldness main-
tained his mind towards God, and had intercourse
with the saints in that contemplation of intelligible
things, which he held in the place figuratively termed
by Moses Paradise."
This extract will be sufficient to show that the
greatest of the Nicene Fathers was thoroughly in
sympathy with the higher side of Neoplatonism, a
fact which goes far to explain the absence of appeal
to Neoplatonic doctrine on the part of his opponents.
To confront the teaching of the New Testament with
that of Plotinus would be to abandon all claim to be
considered Christians, and without doing this it was
difficult to show themselves more in sympathy with
Neoplatonism than the orthodox party.
iii
We now reach the last great effort that was made
by the Neoplatonists to oust Christianity from the
position which it had won, and to restore the old
pagan system in its stead. With regard to the
philosophy of Julian something has been said in an
earlier chapter ; it remains to discuss briefly his
attitude towards the Church. His aversion to
Christianity is not difficult to explain1. The faith
reached him through the agency of insincere teachers :
it was tainted with Arianism, and poisoned by asso-
ciation with the name of Constantius. On the other
hand paganism could now appeal to his sympathy
as a persecuted religion : it brought with it all the
1 Cf. Kendall, The Emperor Julian, pp. 41, 44.
V] NEOPLATONISM AND CHRISTIANITY IO/
attractions of Greek poetry and Greek philosophy, and
was in fact associated with all that was bright in
the recollections of his boyhood. From professed
adherence to Christianity he passed through Neo-
platonism to an attachment to paganism, at first
concealed, but after his cousin's death openly avowed.
What then was the policy which Julian adopted
towards Christianity ? Persecution, so far as was
possible, he avoided, but all methods of checking
Christianity short of persecution he welcomed. He
wrote against the Christians, he forbade Christians to
teach the classics, and more striking than either of
these methods, he endeavoured to re-model paganism
on Christian lines. In his seven books against the
Christians1 he seems to have argued against Christian
refusal to recognise the inherence of evil in matter,
to have quoted a number of passages from the Old
Testament to prove the immorality and impotence of
God, and to have subjected the New Testament to
the same unsparing criticism. He utterly failed to
understand Christianity, and he allowed his prejudice
against it to influence the whole of his writings on
the subject.
The educational edict was no less a part of the
attempt to restore paganism. If the old religion was
to recover its ground, it was needful to help it to make
a start, and the manifest unfairness, in Julian's eyes,
of allowing the classics to be taught by those who
refused to accept the gods in whose honour they were
written, seemed to justify this, ingenious measure of
repression. It was doubtless intended to aid the side
1 Cf. Kendall, pp. 232-6.
IO8 THE RELATIONS BETWEEN [V
of paganism by giving a pagan bias to the whole of
the higher education of the Empire as well as by
conferring a valuable monopoly upon pagan teachers.
But the most interesting of all Julian's actions
were his endeavours to reform paganism. He re-
cognised the enormous superiority of the Christians,
in their general standard of morality and in the
organization of their Church. In both points Julian
attempted to learn a lesson from his opponents. "He
introduced an elaborate sacerdotal system. The
practices of sacred reading, preaching, praying, anti-
phonal singing, penance and a strict ecclesiastical
discipline were all innovations in pagan ritual. Added
to these was a system of organized almsgiving like
that to which Julian attributed so much of the success
of Christianity ; with the proceeds temples might be
restored, the poor succoured, the sick and destitute
relieved. Nay, if Gregory's words are more than
rhetoric, even monasteries and nunneries, refuges and
hospitals, were reared in the name of paganism1."
The attempt however failed. Julian had over-
estimated the power of heathenism as much as he
had underestimated that of Christianity. He hoped
that by extending to paganism that patronage which
had for the last forty years been given to Christianity,
the old religion would be able to assert itself and
eject the usurper. But it was too late, and Julian's
effort proved to be, not as he had hoped, the dawn of a
new day, but the last flicker of paganism before its
lamp went out for ever.
1 Kendall, p. 252.
V] NEOPLATONISM AND CHRISTIANITY 109
iv
We have now endeavoured to trace the attitude
of Neoplatonism towards Christianity from the time
of Plotinus to that of Julian. Sometimes the Church
was treated by the School with disdainful silence :
sometimes there was an outbreak of open antagonism ;
but the official attitude, if we may use the term, was
never friendly. At the same time there are several
instances of individual pagans who were first attracted
by the teaching of the Neoplatonists, and who
passed from that to a belief in Jesus Christ, finding in
the Gospel something which satisfied them in a way
which the abstract teaching of philosophy was unable
to do. Such a man was Hilary of Poictiers1. Born
in Western Gaul at the very beginning of the fourth
century, he was well educated like many other
provincials of his day. He learned Greek, and in
his earlier manhood he studied Neoplatonism ; and
thus in middle life he approached Christianity. We
cannot say whether it was before or after his conversion
that he became acquainted with the works of Origen,
but at some period he appears to have been a careful
student, not of Origen only but of Clement and
even of Philo. The way in which he was led on
from Neoplatonism to Christianity may best be
described in his own words2 : " While my mind was
dwelling on these and on many like thoughts, I
chanced upon the books which, according to the
1 See E. W. Watson's Introduction, in Nicene and Post-Nicene
Fathers.
2 De Trinitaie, i. 5, E. W. Watson's trans.
1 10 THE RELATIONS BETWEEN [V
tradition of the Hebrew faith were written by Moses
and the prophets ; and found in them words spoken
by God the Creator, testifying of Himself I AM
THAT I AM, and again HE THAT IS hath sent
me unto you. I confess that I was amazed to find in
them an indication concerning God so exact that it
expressed in the terms best adapted to human under-
standing an unattainable insight into the mystery of
the divine nature. For no property of God which
the mind can grasp is more characteristic of Him than
existence,... and it was worthy of Him to reveal this
one thing, that HE IS, as an assurance of His
absolute eternity."
Nor does Hilary stand alone, as an educated
pagan who passed through Neoplatonism to Chris-
tianity. Born half a century later, in 354 A.D., at
Thagaste in North Africa, Augustine travelled on
almost the same road. He differed indeed from
Hilary in that his mother was a Christian, so that
he " sucked in the name of Christ with his mother's
milk1/' but Monnica, though a saint, was not an
intellectual woman, and for many years she had
little influence over her brilliant but wayward son. He
followed his own bent. Questions of one kind and
another soon began to trouble him, and first of all he
turned to the Manicheans for an answer. They offered
to solve one half of his difficulties by sweeping away
the Old Testament with all its problems, and the
other half by declaring that the world is as bad as
it can be, so that no man is responsible for his own
1 Aug. Conf. 3. 4.
V] NEOPLATONISM AND CHRISTIANITY III
sins. But Augustine could not rest satisfied with
this creed for long. His own common sense, and the
evil lives of some of the Manicheans, decided him to
seek for something better : and in his twenty-ninth
year, when lecturer in Rhetoric at Milan, he began
to apply himself closely to the study of Neoplatonism.
This cleared away his intellectual difficulties, but
still it failed to satisfy him. The Neoplatonic con-
ception of sin as a pure negation which does not
really affect the inner life and soul of the sinner, and
which can be driven out of the system by a course
of discipline, he felt to be incomplete: and the
sermons of Ambrose, Bishop of Milan, drew him on
to a fuller understanding of the depth and comfort
of the Christian faith. So he passed on to his baptism
at the age of thirty-two, and four years later he was
ordained. In 395 he was consecrated Bishop as
coadjutor to Valerius, after whose death in the
following year he became Bishop of the diocese of
Hippo. This office he continued to hold, up to the
time of his death in 430 A.D.
It will be well to consider the case of Augustine a
little more closely, for we are fortunate in possessing
ample evidence as to the effect produced by Neo-
platonism upon his life and thought. We have in
the first place the detailed account of his conversion
written by himself in the Confessions and we also
find in his later writings a mass of material out of
which to form an estimate of the permanence of the
mark left by Neoplatonism upon his theology.
Neoplatonism, as we have seen, was the half-way
house at which Augustine made a stay between
112 THE RELATIONS BETWEEN [V
Manicheism and Christianity1. At the time of his
baptism, and indeed for some years after, its influence
upon him was very strong, but gradually his feeling
of obligation to the school faded away, and in his
later writings we sometimes find him using stern
language about the dangers of philosophy2. There
was however one lesson of enduring value which
Augustine owed to the Neoplatonists. It was to
them that he owed his first grasp of the doctrine
of the Being of God3. From the Neoplatonists he
would learn about the transcendent greatness of God,
how God is so entirely beyond our knowledge that
it is better to confess ignorance than rashly to claim
that we comprehend Him. It is impossible to
describe Him in positive terms, and all that we can
do is to define in some directions what He is not4.
Thus God is simple and unchangeable, incorruptible
and eternal, untrammelled by limitations of time and
space, ever present, yet always in a spiritual, not in
a corporeal sense, infinitely great, infinitely good,
infinite in His power and justice5. And it is to be
noted that not only is Augustine's teaching about
the Being of God similar to that of Plotinus, but that
there is a close parallelism between the arguments
and illustrations whereby the two writers seek to
establish their respective positions6. It is not too
1 Grandgeorge, Saint Augustin et le Neo-Platonisme, p. 149.
2 e.g. Serm. 348; Grandgeorge, p. 28.
3 Ib. p. 60.
4 Aug. De Civ. Dei, 9. 16; Serm. 117. 5; De Trin. 82.
5 Cf. Plot. Enn. 6. 5. 9, 3. 9. 3, 4. 4. n, 3. 7. i ; Aug. Conf. i. 2,
n. 31, 12. ii ; De Miis. 6. 11
6 Cf. Grandgeorge, p. 70.
V] NEOPLATONISM AND CHRISTIANITY 113
much to say that in this department of theology,
Augustine's expression of his doctrine was largely
coloured by the writings of Plotinus which he had
studied.
But Christian doctrine and Augustinian theology
carry us beyond bald statements about the attributes
of the Deity, and it will be well for us to compare the
teaching of Augustine with that of Plotinus on the
subject of the Trinity1. There is of course at first
sight an obvious similarity between Neoplatonism
and Christianity in this matter. Both alike speak
of the Supreme Being as in some sense threefold.
Both alike insist on Existence and Unity and Good-
ness as the absolute prerogatives of the ultimate
source of all being. There is moreover a close
resemblance between the terms Mind and Word,
Soul and Spirit, which they apply respectively to the
second and third manifestations of the One Deity.
At the same time, a very little examination will
make it plain that this resemblance is only superficial.
The very word Subsistence, vTroo-raat,^, which is
applied by both to the Persons or Principles of the
Trinity, is used in different senses. In the writings
of Plotinus, it signifies substantial existence, and
when the Neoplatonists distinguish between three
Subsistences in their trinity, they are emphasizing
the very doctrine which the orthodox party in the
Arian controversy strained every nerve to refute, —
the doctrine that there is a difference of substance
between the Father, the Son and the Holy Ghost.
On the other hand, when a post-Nicene Father
1 Cf. Grandgeorge,-c. in.
E.N. 8
114 THE RELATIONS BETWEEN [V
employs the term, he signifies by it a Person, and
this in turn is what Plotinus refused to predicate of
his first Principles.
And when we go further, and compare the two
doctrines in detail, we cannot fail to be struck by
the utter absence of love in the Neoplatonic system.
Not only is The One absolutely impersonal, but it
takes cognizance of nothing except itself. It is true
that Mind emanates from The One, and in due
course Soul emanates from Mind, but in each case,
the superior principle entirely ignores the existence
of that below, and looks simply and solely to itself
and to that above. There is thus no thought of the
mutual Love which subsists between the Three
Persons of the Holy Trinity, and the three principles
of Neoplatonism are subordinated one to another,
and are in no sense coeternal together and coequal1.
The only real identity of teaching lies in this, that
Christian and Neoplatonist alike emphasize the
Unity of God, and both alike hold that this unity
somehow admits of plurality, and that there is some
kind of Trinity connected with the Supreme Being.
It may be remarked that the Christian doctrine
of the Holy Trinity is anterior to the rise of Neo-
platonism, so that it is not to be imagined that the
Church derived her teaching from the philosophers.
At the same time it is possible that the writings of
Philo and the Neoplatonists helped the Christian
Fathers to clear their ideas, when it became necessary
to expand and define the doctrine of the Church.
There is of course a difference between the stand-
1 Plot. Enn. 5. 2. 2.
V] NEOPLATONISM AND CHRISTIANITY 115
points of the two, for the Christian dogma is not a
philosophical thesis but a verity of revealed religion.
But in maintaining the philosophical reasonableness
of the doctrine, the Christian apologist found an ally
in Plotinus, for part at all events of the struggle ; and
of his help Augustine is willing to avail himself so far
as it goes.
We next pass on to the relations between God
and the created world1. In the view of Plotinus and
of Augustine alike, the world is the result of God's
actiofc : but there their agreement ceases. We have
seen that the Neoplatonic principles are devoid of
love ; they are no less devoid of will. It is true
that the intelligible world owes its origin to Mind
and the physical world has been derived from Soul,
but neither of these creative acts is an expression
of the ^vjll. Each world is rather the inevitable
result of' the goodness of the creator, the necessary
shadow or 'reflection of the infinite2. Plotinus com-
pares the creating principle to a spring or to the life
in a tree, and creation to the ripples on the surface of
the water, or to the twigs and branches in which the
life gives evidence of its presence3. To Augustine on
the other hand there is no question of necessity or
inevitability. The world is in a real sense created,
not generated ; it owes its existence to the Will of
God, and it was made out of nothing4. There is in
fact no need for the interposition of a series of links
between God and matter. We find then in Plotinus
1 Cf. Grandgeorge, c. iv.
2 Plot. Enn. 3. i. 2. 3 Ib. 3. 8. 10.
4 Aug. De Fid. et Symb. 1.2; Grandgeorge, p. 1 10.
8—2
Il6 THE RELATIONS BETWEEN [V
three subsistences, emanating one from another, and
giving birth to the world by the sheer necessity of
their nature, and in Augustine, the creation of the
world by the voluntary act of the One God, freely
done out of His loving kindness towards His creatures.
It remains to compare the teaching of Plotinus
with that of Augustine upon the problem of evil1.
According to Plotinus, the source of evil in the world
is to be found in the inherent qualities of matter.
Matter contains elements of change and decay, and
it is therefore the absolute antithesis of true existence
or goodness. And just as the world contains elements
of good, because it has come into existence through
the inevitable working of the goodness of Soul, so,
taking as it does its visible form from matter, it con-
tains no less inevitably elements of evil2. At the
same time, evil is devoid of real existence — it is in
fact but a lesser degree of good — so that the physical
world, albeit imperfect, is still a true copy of the in-
telligible. Indeed the world as a whole is good and
happy, and it is as foolish to condemn the whole
because parts are faulty, as it would be to condemn
the whole human race because it produced a Thersites3.
Now man's sinfulness is the necessary result of his
bodily nature, but this union of soul and body is not
entirely evil. In spite of the tendency to sin, human
liberty is safeguarded, for the soul is capable, if it
chooses, of detaching itself from the sensible world
and turning back towards the intelligible, nor can
the body prevent it from so doing. It is therefore
possible for man, by a long course of self-discipline,
1 Cf. Grandgeorge, c. v. 2 Enn. 3. 2. 2. 3 Ib. 3. 2. 3.
V] NEOPLATONISM AND CHRISTIANITY 1 1/
to purify himself, and to rise at last into union with
The One1.
These views of Plotinus made a profound impres-
sion on the mind of Augustine. Not only had he
himself passed through Manicheism in his earlier
years, but after his conversion he was still engaged in
combating Gnostic dualism. And in discussing the
problem of evil, no less than in maintaining the
doctrine of the Holy Trinity, he was always ready to
make use of such help as Neoplatonism could supply.
Nor was it difficult for him to do so. Church and
School alike based their teaching on the doctrine that
the world owes its existence to the goodness of God,
and in this particular connexion there was no need to
draw attention to the difference between Generation
and Creation. Accordingly Augustine makes free
use of statements and illustrations which recall the
teaching of Plotinus. He reminds us that there is
abundant evidence of God's good providence in the
world, and asserts that the world is indubitably the
work of a perfect craftsman2. Yet the fact remains that
we see evil all around us. How can this be explained ?
We see it because the world, though good, is not
perfect. If it were perfect, it would be incorruptible :
were it not good it would be below the possibility of
further corruption. And evil, in spite of appearances
to the contrary, is devoid of true existence: for, if it
possessed true being, it would of necessity be good3.
Again, like Plotinus, Augustine is confident of
the ultimate triumph of good, and like him too he
suggests that evil may even be regarded as a factor
1 Enn. 6. 9. ii. 2 Aug. De Civ. Dei, n. 22. 8, Aug. Conf. 7. 12.
Il8 THE RELATIONS BETWEEN [V
in the progress of mankind. Poverty and sickness
are sometimes conducive to the well-being of the
body, and it may be that our sins actually conduce to
the progress of the universe1. At this point however
the Christian Father is faced with a problem from
which the heathen philosopher is free. If this view
be correct, if evil actually leads us on towards good,
why does God punish the guilty ? Augustine parries
the question by answering that it is the sin that is
punished, whilst it is the soul that makes the progress.
Indeed it is this system of reward for good and punish-
ment for sin that enables the universe to be as perfect
as it is. For sin is not truly natural to us, but a
voluntary affection of our nature, and in the same
way punishment must be regarded, not indeed as
natural, but as a penal affection consequent upon sin2.
The key to the whole problem of evil is found by
Augustine and Plotinus alike, in the unbroken chain
of causation which we see in the universe. Nothing
comes to pass by mere chance : everything is the result
of some cause, and everything too produces its own
effect. We must not then complain blindly against the
existence of sin, for sin is the result of free will, and
without free will man would be less perfect than he
is3. Indeed the world would fall short of its present
perfection, were it not composed of many different
elements, some of them higher in the scale of being
and some lower. We must not complain because the
earthly sphere is not on the same level as the heavenly,
1 Aug. De Ordine, 2. 4; Plot. Enn. 3. 2. n.
2 Aug. De Lib. Arb. 3. 9. 25.
3 Plot. Enn. 3. 2. 7; Aug. De Lib. Arb. 3. i. 2.
V] NEOPLATONISM AND -CHRISTIANITY I 19
but we might reasonably complain if there were no
heaven for us to gaze at from earth1. Evil then has
a legitimate place in the world, but it is simply a
negation, a falling short of the highest possibilities.
There is of course another great section of
Augustine's work to which no reference has as yet
been made — his controversy with the Pelagians upon
the question of Original Sin. But a full discussion of
this subject would carry us far beyond the scope of
the present essay, and it will be sufficient to note that
Augustine's view of original sin does not appear to
be connected with Plotinus' account of the contamina-
tion of the soul due to its descent into matter. But
enough has been said to indicate the extent to which
Augustine was indebted to the Neoplatonists and
the points at which he found their system defective.
It was to him a temporary shelter, where he could
release himself from the entanglements of Manicheism
and make ready for his final conversion to Christianity.
But, that conversion once effected, the influence of
Neoplatonism declined. There was indeed no sudden
break, and to the end of his life Augustine did not
disdain, when necessary, to borrow a weapon from
the Neoplatonic armoury. But the system ceased to
excite his enthusiasm : it had done its work, and
after that it failed to satisfy Augustine as it failed to
conquer the world.
1 Aug. De Lib. Arb. 3. 5. 13.
I2O THE RELATIONS BETWEEN [V
In the earlier part of the present chapter, an
attempt has been made to trace the influence which
was brought to bear upon the leaders of Christianity
by the great representatives of Neoplatonism. It
will be well for us, before going further, to consider
the influence, less direct but not less important, which
Neoplatonism exercised upon the development of
Christian thought through the writings of its greatest
Christian exponent. The name of Origen has always
possessed a remarkable fascination for churchmen of
every school, and this fascination is due to a variety
of causes. It is in part due to the unique position
occupied by Origen in ecclesiastical speculation.
There cannot fail to be something interesting about a
writer who is denounced as the father of Arianism,
and who yet finds a champion in Athanasius. But it
is due no less to the simple holiness of his ascetic life,
the memory of which survived for centuries, even
among those who looked on him as a dangerous
heresiarch. " There is a perplexed controversy "
writes a German chronicler of the fifteenth century,
" in which sundry people engage about Samson,
Solomon, Trajan and Origen, whether they were saved
or not. That I leave to the Lord1."
The position and the teaching were not long
suffered to pass unchallenged2. Even before his
1 Westcott, Religious Thought in the West, p. 224.
2 See A. W. W. Dale, art. " Origenistic Controversies" in Diet.
Christ. Biog.
V] NEOPLATONISM AND CHRISTIANITY 121
death in 253, attacks were made upon him by
Demetrius, Bishop of Alexandria, who seems twice
to have procured his condemnation. On the first of
these occasions there was no direct reference to
doctrine, the charges preferred dealing simply with
the irregularity of Origen's ordination to the Priest-
hood. It is however possible that questions of
doctrine formed part of the second attack, when a
gathering of Egyptian Bishops declared that his
ordination was to be considered null and void. But
this sentence, although it is said by Jerome to have
been ratified by the Bishop of Rome, carried but
little real weight. It merely reflected the personal
feelings of Demetrius, and after his death it was soon
forgotten. Heraclas, the successor alike of Origen at
the Catechetical School and of Demetrius as Bishop
of Alexandria, did nothing to express his approval or
disapproval of the condemnation, but Dionysius, who
followed Heraclas in both offices, openly defended
Origen's teaching and character, and in particular
maintained stoutly the value of allegorical interpreta-
tion. Among those who came after him at Alexandria
may be mentioned the names of Theognostus, who
wrote several books in imitation of the De Principiis>
and Pierius, whose support of Origen's views, alike on
the subordination of the Holy Spirit to the Father
and the Son, and on the pre-natal existence of the
human soul, earned for him the name of " the Second
Origen."
But whilst at Alexandria the influence of Origen
soon reasserted itself, there were other quarters in
which attacks were made upon his teaching. The
122 THE RELATIONS BETWEEN [V
treatise published by Methodius of Patara has already
been mentioned. This was immediately answered by
Pamphilus and Eusebius, who set to work in 306 to
compile a defence of the impugned doctrines. It is
not necessary to enter into the details of their
argument : suffice it to say that, whilst maintaining
the general orthodoxy of Origen in matters of faith,
they admitted that in cases where the church was
silent, he had indulged in speculations of varying
merits. Such tentative theories, however, must not
be placed on a level with statements of doctrine, nor
was it fair to stigmatize their author as heretical.
It has been remarked in an earlier chapter that
the direct influence of Neoplatonism upon the Arian
controversy was less than might perhaps have been
expected. At the same time, the struggle had not gone
far before the name of Origen was dragged in. He was
denounced by many of the orthodox party as the father
of Arianism, and the Arians were, for the most part,
ready enough to claim his authority for their doctrine
of the Logos. At the same time there were curious
exceptions to this rule. Aetius, an Arian writer,
attacked both Origen and Clement, and on the other
side Athanasius defended Origen, and maintained
that the view of the Logos set forth in his writings
was orthodox. It is true that there were speculations
and suggestions of which Athanasius could not approve,
but his doctrine was in the main sound, and his life
had been that of a holy and wonderful saint.
A few years later, in the middle of the fourth
century, there appears on the scene the little band of
Cappadocian Fathers, Basil of Caesarea, Gregory of
V] NEOPLATONISM AND CHRISTIANITY 123
Nazianzus, and Gregory of Nyssa. All three were
enthusiastic students of Origen, and the two former
edited in his defence the series of extracts from his
writings known as the Philocalia. It may be of
interest to add an account of the teaching of Gregory
of Nyssa, in order to illustrate the extent to which
the Cappadocians were indebted to their master, and
the modifications which the lapse of a century had
brought into his system1. According to Gregory,
Philosophy is not identical with Theology, nor yet on
an equality therewith ; it rather occupies the position
of handmaid. The teaching of Plato can indeed be
employed in the defence of Christianity, against
polytheism, but there are times when it is necessary
for us to leave the Platonic car2. He adopts Origen's
view that evil is non-being, and he very nearly
identifies the principle of evil with matter3. God,
from Whom all goodness flows, is unchangeable, but
the act of creation was itself a change from non-
existence into being, and it therefore leaves a
possibility of change in its results. On the other
hand, Gregory seldom refers to the Neoplatonic
distinction between intelligible and sensible, and
prefers to make use of the Christian distinctions
between Creator and created, Infinite and finite.
In thus attempting to set forth Christian doctrines
in a philosophical form, it was inevitable that Gregory
should be in some sense the pupil of him who had
led the way in this branch of research, and to whom
the existing vocabulary of Christian philosophy was
1 Cf. Moore and Wilson, Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers^ vol. v.
2 De Anim. et Resurr. Moore and Wilson, p. 8. 3 Ib. p. 9.
124 THE RELATIONS BETWEEN [V
due. Hence we are not surprised to find that
Gregory adopts and approves of the allegorical
method of interpretation. But in other matters we
find him introducing changes into his master's system.
Thus he combats Origen's theory of the pre-natal
existence of the soul1, accepting the traducianist view,
that the world of spirits was created in idea at the
beginning, but that each individual soul comes into
existence like the body by generation. So too in
the case of the resurrection of the body2. Gregory
partly adopts Origen's teaching, and partly modifies
it, and asserts that creation is to be saved by man's
carrying his created body into a higher world.
There is then plenty of evidence of the popularity
of Origen's writings in the Eastern Church, and of
the influence which they exerted. At the same time
there was no lack of opposition. Epiphanius, the
"sleuth-hound of heresy3" was on his track, and
made no less than four separate attacks upon his
doctrine. His objections fall into three classes,
attacks on the alleged Arian tendencies of Origen's
teaching, attacks on his psychology, and attacks on
the allegorical method of interpretation. But the
object of the present section is not so much to give
a history of the Origenistic controversies, as to trace
out the power and influence of Origen's writings, and
therefore we must turn back for a moment, and mark
the spread of these doctrines among the Latin-speak-
ing Christians of the West.
The days had long since passed away when
1 Moore and Wilson, p. 19. 2 Ib. p. 21.
3 Swete, Patristic Study > p. 86.
V] NEOPLATONISM AND CHRISTIANITY 125
Greek was the natural language, in which to address
the Christians of Italy, and, although there were of
course exceptions, the majority of Western Christians
read Greek philosophy and theology only through
the medium of Latin translations. Thus it was in
Victorinus' translations that Augustine first read the
works of the Neoplatonists1, and in the prefaces to
Jerome's commentaries we find references to those
Christians who are unable to read Alexandrian
theology in the original tongue. Accordingly, at the
beginning of the fourth century there was but little
real knowledge of Origen in the Western Church,
although there was some uneasiness about the views
ascribed to him. But in the latter part of this century,
two scholars set themselves to translate his works
into Latin for the benefit of their fellow-countrymen.
These were Jerome and Rufinus, who had gone to
Palestine to preside over monasteries at Bethlehem
and on the Mount of Olives respectively. Jerome is
said by Rufinus to have translated no fewer than
seventy of Origen's treatises, and several of his extant
works, for instance his Commentary on the Epistle
to the Ephesians, are largely derived from this source
Nor had Jerome, at this early period, any hesitation
about defending Origen against his detractors. In a
letter to Paula written in 385 A.D.2, he declares that
these attacks are due, not to love of orthodoxy, but
to envy of the Alexandrian Father's genius.
But soon there comes a change. In 392 an
Egyptian monk named Aterbius visited Jerusalem,
and accused Rufinus of heresy, on account of his
1 Aug. Con/. 8. 2. 2 Hieron. ep. 33, Migne.
126 THE RELATIONS BETWEEN [V
support of Origen. This accusation caused Jerome
considerable alarm, and when, two years later,
Epiphanius followed with a yet stronger indictment,
Jerome declared himself the opponent of Origen's
doctrine. Rufinus on the other hand stood firm.
He published translations, first of the Apology of
Pamphilus and Eusebius, and then of Origen's De
PrincipiiS) and begged his readers to disregard the
cry of heresy, and to learn the truth for themselves.
At the same time, he tried to reassure them by
declaring his own firm belief in the Holy Trinity
and in the resurrection of the body, and by asserting
that the heretical passages in Origen's works were
later interpolations.
It would be a thankless task to discuss in detail
the long and wearisome controversy which followed.
Both Jerome and Rufinus allowed themselves to be
so far carried away by the heat of the conflict as to
forget the moderation which their position as theo-
logians of the Christian Church demanded. The
victory rested with the opponents of Origen.
Anastasius, Bishop of Rome, after an examination,
not indeed of the whole of Origen's works, but of a
series of excerpts forwarded to him by the partizans
of Epiphanius, formally condemned his writings, and
reprimanded Rufinus. The later stages of the quarrel
assumed a political rather than a theological character,
and need not detain us. But the whole controversy
shows the importance of the position which Origen
was felt to occupy in Christian speculation, and the
interest that was taken in his writings. Even after
his condemnation there were probably many like
V] NEOPLATONISM AND CHRISTIANITY 12?
Theophilus of Alexandria, who continued to read his
works "culling the flower and passing by the thorn1."
Nor must the influence of the Latin translations be
forgotten, for even if the works of Rufinus were
regarded with disfavour, there was no such stigma
attaching to the earlier writings of Jerome, several
of which were largely based on Origen.
It is pleasant to turn from the polemics of
Epiphanius and Jerome to one of the most delightful
characters of the ancient world. Of Synesius the
philosopher something has been said in the last
chapter : we are now concerned with Synesius the
Christian. It is not easy to assign a date to his
conversion. He married a Christian lady, perhaps in
403 A.D., and it is probable that three out of his six
Christian hymns were written before 406 2. It is thus
reasonable to suppose that he was converted four or
five years before his elevation to the Episcopate in
409. But at a yet earlier date, during his visit to
Constantinople, we find him ready to pray in the
Christian Churches3, and it is probable that he had
scant sympathy with those Neoplatonists who still
indulged in theurgy, and opposed Christianity. It
has been suggested that his conversion was brought
about by two main causes, " a deepening sense of his
own difficulty in keeping clean from matter, and a
growing sympathy for the needs and sorrows of
common people4." In other words, he learned by
experience the defects of unaided Neoplatonism ; its
1 Socrates, Hist. Eccl. 6. 17.
2 Glover, Life and Letters in the Fourth Century, p. 346.
3 Hymn. 3. 448. 4 Glover, p. 347.
128 THE RELATIONS BETWEEN [V
inability to raise man to the high standard which
it set forth, and its lack of a message for any but the
intellectual few.
At the same time Synesius felt no difficulty in
maintaining his philosophical tenets side by side
with the Christian faith. His friendship with Hypatia
was interrupted only by death, and in spite of
the recent controversies, he boldly proclaimed his
Origenistic sympathies before he would permit him-
self to be consecrated Bishop of Ptolemais. He
refused to give up his belief in the pre-natal existence
of the soul, in the eternity of the world, and in
Origen's doctrine of the resurrection of the body. "If
I can be Bishop on these terms, philosophizing at
home and speaking in parables abroad, I accept the
office.... What have the people to do with Philosophy ?
Divine truth must be and is rightly an unspeakable
mystery1." He adopts in fact the position of Origen,
respecting the claim of the " man in the congregation "
for recognition as a true member of the Church, but
reserving, for himself and those like him, the right
to maintain an esoteric doctrine to which ordinary
persons could not attain. Happily for the people
of Ptolemais, and happily too for the Church,
Theophilus of Alexandria was willing to accept him
on these terms, and to consecrate the man who so
boldly maintained the doctrines which he had himself
elsewhere endeavoured to stamp out.
We must not linger over the history of Synesius'
episcopate. As our knowledge of the man would
lead us to suppose, it was marked by a courageous
1 Syn. Ep. 105; cf. Nicoll, Synesius, p. 125.
V] NEOPLATONISM AND CHRISTIANITY 1 29
championship of the poor and suffering, an unflinching
determination to attack and reprove wrong doing in
high places, and a readiness to protect the former
wrong doer when he in turn was threatened with
injustice. Synesius died at some date between 413
and 431, and our knowledge of the Church over
which he presided comes to a close.
VI
It now remains to add some account of the two
writers through whose works the ideas of Neoplatonism
continued to influence men's thought during the
Middle Ages. Both of them were acute thinkers,
strongly influenced by the school of Proclus : one
seems to have been a monk, connected probably with
Edessa, and living at the close of the fifth century ;
the other was one of the most famous scholars and
statesmen of the early decades of the sixth. The
name of the statesman was Boethius, the name of the
monk is unknown, but his works were published
under the pseudonym of ' Dionysius the Areopagite.'
Let us first turn to ' Dionysius1.' We find the
earliest mention of his writings in 533 A.D. when an
appeal was made to their authority by the Severians,
a monophysite sect at Constantinople. The appeal
was disallowed by the orthodox party on the ground
that a work of the Apostolic age which was unknown
to Cyril and Athanasius was hardly to be considered
authentic. But before many years had elapsed the
writings won their way to wide-spread popularity.
1 See Westcott, Religious Thought in the West, pp. 142 ff.
E. N. Q
I3O THE RELATIONS BETWEEN [V
It is true that Photius, in the ninth century, pointed
out that the books were unknown to Eusebius and
the early Fathers, and that they contained various
anachronisms. But this criticism came too late
to interfere with the influence and authority of
' Dionysius.' For two centuries and a half the books
had been quoted with respect by many Greek writers,
and in 827 A.D., fifteen or twenty years before the
date of Photius' objections, a copy of the writings
presented by Michael the Stammerer to Louis I of
France had been enshrined with much ceremony in
the Abbey of St Denis, where the Areopagite was
reputed to have been buried. From that moment
their position in Europe was secure. Not only did
the works of ' Dionysius ' exercise a considerable
influence upon Joannes Scotus in the ninth century,
but from the twelfth to the fifteenth centuries they
formed the subject of a whole series of commentaries
and translations, written by eminent scholars and
ecclesiastics of the day. It was only after the Re-
naissance that the doubts about their authenticity
were revived, and the Dionysian origin of the books
finally disproved.
It was not without reason that the unknown
author assumed a title which suggested the combina-
tion of Christianity with Greek philosophy. In the
four great treatises which are still extant we find a
careful attempt to show that the teaching, of Proclus
and the teaching of the Church supplement and'
illuminate each other. In the first treatise, On the
Heavenly Hierarchy ', ' Dionysius ' describes a mighty
series or system of creatures, called into existence
V] NEOPLATONISM AND CHRISTIANITY 131
by God, and together forming an immense ladder of
being, stretching down from God's throne. At every
stage in this series there is a certain knowledge of
God attainable by the faithful worshipper, at every
stage too it is possible for him to climb to the stage
above, where he will gain a closer fellowship with
the Supreme Being1. Man is but one link in this
mighty chain, and man's view of God is necessarily
incomplete. Man is finite and God is infinite, so
that man can only speak and think of God in finite
and imperfect terms. Yet man's knowledge of God,
though incomplete, is not necessarily false, for God
reveals Himself to man, alike in the world around us,
and by special means which He has employed at
various times ; and if man makes use of these
opportunities, God will lead him on to something
higher.
We need not linger over the details of the
Heavenly Hierarchy, or follow 'Dionysius' as he
traces out the functions of the nine orders of angels.
We pass on to the treatise On the Ecclesiastical
Hierarchy. Here we learn that there is on earth an
image or reflection of the great system in the heavens.
It stands on a lower level than its heavenly counter-
part, just as the material world in which we move
is on a lower level than the spiritual world in which
the angels have their being2. Yet the Church, the
Ecclesiastical Hierarchy, is none the less divine in
origin, and it has a mighty task entrusted to it. It
is the task of bringing salvation to men and to those
1 Westcott, R.T.W.^.\^i\ Dion, de Gael Hier. i. 3.
2 DeEccl.Hier. i. 2.
9—2
132 THE RELATIONS BETWEEN [V
above us, — a salvation that consists in being made
like God1. The doctrines of the Ecclesiastical
Hierarchy have been enshrined in Holy Scriptures,
which are themselves inspired by God ; its organiza-
tion, and the sacraments and other services which
it employs, symbolize for us various aspects of its
fellowship with God. The writer then proceeds to
describe in detail various sacraments and ordinances
of the Church, adding in every case an explanation
of the symbolism.
The object of the third treatise, On the Divine
Names, is to show that, while we cannot know God
entirely as He is, we are yet able, by the right use of our
powers and opportunities, to obtain a partial knowledge
of Him. We must begin by asserting the Unity of God.
God is above all One ; all that exists comes from
Him, and was therefore itself originally one. And
when creation comes to that perfection for which
God has designed it, it will be completely at unity
with itself and with Him2. But while it is easy to
assert the Unity of God, it is not possible to comprehend
it. For the Unity of the infinite God is beyond all
mind, and most of all is it beyond the comprehension
of our minds. At the same time there are names
which we are right in applying to God, not because
they give a complete description of God, but because
they are true so far as they go, and describe Him so
far as we are able to do so. Some of these names
apply to the whole Godhead, for instance Being,
Goodness and the like. Others, as Father, Son,
Word, Spirit, apply to particular Persons, But both
1 De Eccl. Hier. 1.3. 2 De Div. Nom. 2. 7, 4. 10.
V] NEOPLATONISM AND CHRISTIANITY 133
sets of terms are true, and both are inadequate, since
they only express God in terms suitable for our
limited understandings1.
The next great characteristic of God, after His
Unity, is His Goodness. Just as the sun, because it is
the sun, shines on all alike, so God, because He is
God, extends His love to all His creatures. There is
no corner of creation beyond His reach : there is no
creature to which He is not ready to show Himself a
loving Father. Or, in other words, " Everything that
is is from the fair and good, and is in the fair and
good, and turns to the fair and good2." But if this
be so, what are we to say about evil? The answer
is that evil, as such, has no real existence. It is
a falling short, a failure to reach the full develop-
ment of which this or that creature was capable.
Evil objects exist in abundance, but they owe their
existence to the fact that they all partake in some
measure, however small, of good. Evil itself is a
falling short, and it therefore varies according to the
peculiar character of every object in which it is said
to occur. It springs from defects of many different
kinds, as free beings fail in one way and another to
reach the development for which God intended them.
" But," says { Dionysius/ " God knows the evil as it is
good3." He looks, that is, not at the extent to which
this or that being has fallen short of His design, but
at the extent to which it is fulfilling it And it is
because to some extent, however small, the evil powers
are working for good, that He allows them to continue.
In the case of man the matter is further explained
1 De Div. Nom. i. i. 2 Westcott, R. T. W. p. 179.
3 De Div. Nom. 4. 30. Westcott, R. T. W. p. 180.
134 THE RELATIONS BETWEEN [V
by this, that God has given man freedom of choice,
and He respects the free will that He has given. He
will not compel man to be good by force.
But a further question arises. If evil has no real
existence, and if the sinner is to some extent working
out God's purpose, why does God punish him ? It
is because God gave the sinner power to do a great
deal more than he is doing towards carrying His
purpose into effect, and He punishes the negligence
which the sinner's free choice has caused1. 'Dionysius'
then goes on to show that all creation is in harmony
with God. The purpose for which it was made, and
the gradual realisation of that purpose both owe their
existence to God, and are derived from Him.
In the last treatise, On Mystical Theology
' Dionysius ' tries to carry us a little further. He
endeavours to enable the reader to rise above the
world that we can see and touch and think about,
and to secure a truer knowledge of God by laying
aside every form of thought or expression which
seems to limit Him to the things of this world. In
the work On the Divine Names the method employed
is for the most part affirmative. The writer takes the
names which describe God's nature and expounds
their meaning. In the present work the negative
method naturally predominates, and God is described,
not by the attributes which He possesses, but by the
limitations from which He is free.
The style of ' Dionysius ' is wearisome and
verbose, and it is easy to quote phrases and paragraphs
which appear to the modern reader to be meaningless
jargon. But the foregoing summary will suffice to
1 De Div. Nom. 4. 35.
V] NEOPLATONISM AND CHRISTIANITY 135
show that ' Dionysius ' made a real contribution to
human thought, and that apart from the title which
he assumed, his works contained a living message for
those who could understand them.
The personal history of * Dionysius ' can only be
pieced together from the internal evidence of his
writings. With Boethius however the case is different1.
His father, Aurelius Manlius Boethius, held various
important posts under Odovacar, rising to the consul-
ship in 487 A.D. Anicius Manlius Severinus Boethius
was born in or about the year 480, and though he
was yet a mere child when his father died, he was
carefully educated by his kinsmen Festus and
Symmachus. He learned Greek and was soon
attracted by Greek works on science and philosophy of
all kinds, many of which he translated for the benefit
of his Latin-speaking contemporaries. He also wrote
several commentaries on the works of Aristotle, and
composed a series of Theological Tracts in'which he
attempted to apply philosophical methods to the current
doctrinal controversies. Boethius must have become
acquainted with Theodoric soon after that Emperor's
arrival in Rome in the year 504 : for we find him elected
Sole Consul in 510, and he enjoyed the Emperor's
favour long enough to see his two sons elevated to
the Consulship in 522. But suddenly his fortune
changed. An injudicious speech in praise of old
Roman freedom awakened Theodoric's suspicions :
Boethius was arraigned and imprisoned, and after being
condemned by the Senate he was tortured and put
to death with a club.
1 Cf. H. F. Stewart, Boethius.
136 THE RELATIONS BETWEEN [V
During his imprisonment he wrote five books On
the Consolation of Philosophy. In the first book he
describes himself in the prison, weeping and striving
in vain to distract his thoughts by writing verses.
Suddenly there appears before him the stately figure
of Philosophy. She is a woman, venerable in appear-
ance yet ever young, clad in a robe of her own
weaving, holding a book in one hand and a sceptre in
the other. She drives away the Muses, and stays
herself to comfort the prisoner. In the remainder
of the work Boethius tells how his mysterious visitor
reasoned with him, brushing aside his anger against
Fortune, who is a true friend only when she frowns :
showing how insufficient are the aims which most
men seek to achieve, and pointing out that while the
triumph of the wicked in the world is always more
apparent than real, their punishment is swift and
inevitable. This leads on to a discussion about the
difference between Providence and Fate, and the
relation of both to the divine Simplicity : and the
work closes with an elaborate discussion of man's
free will, as it exists side by side with the fore-
knowledge of God.
It is remarkable that in this work the leading
ideas of Christianity should be almost entirely
omitted. There is no reason to suppose that Boethius
was a heathen. The Theological Tracts show clearly
enough that he was well acquainted with western
theology ; and yet in the books with which he solaced
the dreariness of his imprisonment there is no word
about a Redeemer. The standpoint from which he
writes is throughout that of the Neoplatonist, and the
V] NEOPLATONISM AND CHRISTIANITY 137
references to Christianity are few and far between.
Are we to suppose that Boethius had given up
all faith in the Gospel and turned instead to the
consolations of Philosophy ? Yet if that were so we
should expect to find some expression of disappoint-
ment or bitterness against the support that had failed
him. Another explanation has however been sug-
gested1. The style of the treatise is throughout cold
and formal, and it may be that it was written, like the
verses which Boethius was composing when Philosophy
appeared, merely to while away the tedious hours of
confinement. If this be so, we should be mistaken
in regarding the work as the expression of Boethius'
ultimate grounds of confidence, and must look on it
rather as a task undertaken in order to distract his
attention during a time of suspense. If this theory
be accepted, the treatise loses somewhat in reality,
but we have at the same time a key to a problem
which might otherwise be difficult to solve.
The popularity of Boethius in the Middle Ages
was extraordinary2. It would be difficult to find a
secular writer whose works were more often translated
or more widely read. In our own land his influence
is to be traced in Beowulf, the earliest of Anglo-
Saxon epics (c. 800 A.D.), whilst the Consolation of
Philosophy was translated or paraphrased by King
Alfred (878), and in later days by Chaucer (1340-
1400). Nor were other countries less willing to do
him honour. Between the eleventh and the fourteenth
centuries translations of the Consolation were published
in France, Italy, Germany, Spain and Greece, and
1 Stewart, p. 106. 2 See Stewart, Boethius, c. vi.
138 THE RELATIONS BETWEEN [V
indirect references are to be found in many poems
and romances as well. The fame and influence of
' Dionysius ' and of Boethius alike, have long since
died away. There are few persons of ordinary
culture to-day who could if asked either tell the
names or describe the contents of their writings.
Nor is the reason difficult to find. They transmitted
to the Middle Ages something of the spirit of Greek
philosophy, and in so doing they conferred a great
and lasting benefit. But when in the fifteenth century
learning revived, and men began once more to study
the Greek classics for themselves, the lustre of
' Dionysius ' and Boethius was bound to wane.
They had done their work, and when the literature
from which their inspiration was derived came to be
widely known and read, they relapsed into comparative
obscurity.
It is impossible, within the bounds of this essay,
to trace the influence of Neoplatonism upon medi-
aeval and modern thought. The speculations of
Joannes Scotus, and their reception by the theologians
of his time, the rise of the Cambridge Platonists in
the seventeenth century, the attention that is paid to-
day, alike to Plotinus and his school, and to the
Christian Fathers who in part reflect their teaching,
show clearly that the force of Neoplatonism did not
perish when Justinian closed the lecture-rooms. But
these themes, attractive and fascinating as they are,
would carry us far beyond the limits of the present
work.
V] NEOPLATONISM AND CHRISTIANITY 139
Two questions however remain upon which a few
words may be added. What caused the failure of
Neoplatonism to hold its own against the spread of
Christianity, and what was the contribution that it
made to the development of Christian theology ? To
the first of these questions the answer would seem to
be, that Neoplatonism even in its highest and purest
form, was incapable of answering all the questions
which man seeks to solve. It dealt exclusively with
abstract Principles. It spoke of a supreme Being,
but never of a personal God. It told of beauty and
goodness, but never of love. And therefore it failed
to claim the allegiance of the whole man. It was in
fact throughout an intellectual system, and it could
never satisfy the cravings of the human heart.
But, with regard to the second question, it would
-be a mistake to suppose that Neoplatonism made no
contribution to Christian theology. " In divers por-
tions and in divers manners," God spake "in time
past to the fathers in the prophets1." Little by little,
as man was able to receive it, the message was given.
And, though the revelation was completed once and
for all, in the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ, it was
still necessary for its content to be worked out and
assimilated. And Neoplatonism, under the guiding
hand of God, helped to bring out some aspects of the
truth which might otherwise have long remained un-
noticed. The earliest Christians, trained under the
strict discipline of the Jewish law, had received defi-
nite teaching about the unity and the eternal existence
of God. They knew that the world was made by
1 Heb. i. i.
140 NEOPLATONISM AND CHRISTIANITY [V
Him, and that it is not co-extensive with Him. They
knew also that He is not the author of evil, and that
the evil in the world is not destined to be eternal.
But soon the Gospel spread to men and races un-
familiar with these doctrines, and there was a danger
that they would be allowed to lapse. It was the task
of the Neoplatonists, through the Christians who
came under their influence, once more to draw men's
attention to such truths as these, and to prevent them
from falling into oblivion. This was its work in the
third and fourth centuries, when so many of the doc-
trines of Christian theology were taking definite shape.
And its reappearance from time to time in the ages
that have followed has served as a witness that the
eternal verities are still beyond human comprehension.
It reminds us that our theology should be a living
organism, that we must not be contented merely to
repeat the formulae of an earlier age, but strive con-
stantly after fuller knowledge and closer fellowship
with the Divine.
INDEX
Academy, Old, Middle and New,
Aedesius, 68
Aetius, 122
Alexander Severus, 20 f.
Alexander the False Prophet, 2
Alexandrian Philosophy :
Jewish, 23, 32
Christian, 41
Neoplatonic, 52, 72
Allegorical Interpretation, 14, 32,
93 f-. 121
Ambrose, 79, in
Amelius, 30, 92
Ammonius Saccas, 26, 33, 50, 51
Anastasius, 126
Anaxagoras, 24, 26
Anebon, Letter to, 61
Antiochus, 29
Antoninus Pius, 12
Apollonius of Tyana, 19 ; jour-
ney to India, 39; compared to
Christ by Hierocles, 67, 88 ;
Philostratus's memoir compared
with the Gospels, 84; absence
of reference to Christianity, 87,
89
Arcesilas, 29
Arian controversy, 105, 122
Aristotle, 29, 31, 35, 74
Athanasius, 105, 122
Augustine, 71, 110-119: life,
nof. ; Neoplatonism his half-
way house, 1 1 1 ; doctrine of
the Being of God, 112; doc-
trine of the Holy Trinity com-
pared with that of Plotinus,
H3f. ; relation of God to
creation, 115 ; problem of evil,
116; controversy with Pela-
gius, 119
Basil of Caesarea, 79, 122
Beowulf, 137
Boethius, 76 ; life and writings,
135 f. ; mediaeval translations,
137 f.
Cappadocian Fathers, 79, 122
Caracalla, 20
Carneades, 29
Catechetical School, 44
Celsus, 8, 1 6, 39
Chrysostom, John, 79
Clement of Alexandria, life and
writings, 45 ; his aim, 47 ; his
theology, 48-50 ; studied by
Hilary, 109
Clement of Rome, 16
Confessions of St Augustine^ 92
Cynics, 32
Cyprian, 78
Cyril of Alexandria, 79
Daemons, 8, 37
Damascius, 76
Damis, 19, 84
De Mysteriis, 62-64
Demetrius of Alexandria, 121
Democritus, 31 f.
Dio Cassius, 5, 20
Diodore, 79
' Dionysius the Areopagite,' 80,
83; date of, 129; popularity,
I42
INDEX
130; writings, 130-134; doc-
trine of God, 132 f . ; problem
of evil, 133 f.
Ecstasy, 36, 50, 58
Egyptian deities, 10
Elagabalus, 20
Eleatics, 25
Emperor, worship of, 6
Epicureans, 3, 31, 47
Epiphanius, 79, 124, 126
Eunapius, 20, 53, 71
Eusebius of Caesarea, 52, 78 ;
his answer to Hierocles, 67 ;
his twofold attitude towards
Neoplatonism, 103 f. ; his de-
fence of Origen, 122, 126
Eusebius of Myndus, 68
Evil a lack of good, 57, 97, 116,
133
Genii, 7
Gnosticism, 43, 89
Good, The, 48, 55
Gordianus, i, 53
Gregory of Nazianzus, 79, 122
Gregory of Nyssa, 79, 122
Gregory Thaumaturgus, 77
Heraclas, 121
Heraclides, 29
Heraclitus, 23, 26
Herennius, 52 f.
Hierocles of Alexandria, 73
Hierocles of Bithynia, 66 f., 88
Hilary, 79, 109 f.
Hypatia, 72f.
lamblichus, life of Pythagoras,
25, 29 ; his elaboration of
Plotinus' system, 65 ; his love
of theurgy, 66
Ideas, 27, 29, 30, 35, 37, 48, 55
Jerome, 79, 125, 127
Joannes Scotus, 83, 130
Julia Domna, 18, 86
Julian, 68-70, 106-108 ; his
system, 69^; his attitude to-
wards Christianity, 106 ; his
writings against the Christians
and his educational edict, 107 ;
his attempt to reform pagan-
ism, 108
Justin Martyr, 13, 43, 45
Justinian, 71, 76, 100
Juvenal, 5
Lampridius, 5, 20
Logos, 23, 34, 48, 89, 122
Longinus, 31, 52, 60
Lucian, if., 12
Manicheism, no
Marcella, 61
Marcus Aurelius, 12, 38
Marinus, 76
Matter, 37, 56, 57
Maximus, 68
Melissus, 25
Methodius, 77, 122
Metrodorus, 32
Mind, 24, 55 f., 89
Minucius Felix, 78
Mithras, 1 1 f. , 70
Monnica, no
Montanism, 3
Mysteries, 3, 11, 16, 45, 54
Nature, 55
Neopythagoreanism, 15, 19, 38
Ntimber, 25, 29, 38
Numenius, 38
Odovacar, 135
One, The, 34, 55
Origen, 5, 18, 45, 52, 60, 77:
Origen compared -with the
Neoplatonists, 91-103: doc-
trines common to both,
92 f. ; use of allegorical
interpretation, 93 f.; trans-
migration of soul, 96 ; the
problem of evil, 97; sub-
ordination of the Holy
Spirit, 97 f. ; resurrection
of the body, 99 f. ; classes
of worship, 102
Later influence of Origen:
on Hilary, 109 ; on Alex-
andrian theology, 121 ; on
the Arian question, 122 ;
INDEX
143
upheld by Athanasius, 122;
on the Cappadocian Fa-
thers, 123 ; on Jerome and
Rufinus, 125; attacked by
Epiphanius, 124; on Sy-
nesius, 128
Origenes the Neoplatonist, 52 f.
Origenistic controversies, 1 20-
129
Paedagogus, 46
Pagan revival, 4
Pamphilus, 122, 126
Pantaenus, 44
Parmenides, 25
Pelagianism, 119
Peregrinus, 2, 4
Philo Byblius, 62
Philo Judaeus, 24, 33-37, 42 ;
doctrine of the Logos, 34 ;
teaching about the Powers, 35 ;
about creation, 36 ; about Ec-
stasy, 36 ; influence on Plotinus,
89 ; on Origen, 102 ; on Hi-
lary, 109
Philostratus, 16, 19, 39, 84
Phoenix, 16
Photius, 130
Pierius, 121
Plato, 26, 27, 30, 32, 34, 38,
45
Plotinus :
Plotinus and earlier systems,
22-40 : Pythagoras, 25 ;
the Eleatics and Being,
25 f. ; Plato and Ideas, 27 ;
the Academy, 29; Aristotle,
30; the Stoics, 31 ; Philo
and Ecstasy, 36 ; Plutarch,
37 ; Clement of Alexandria
and Ecstasy, 50
Plotinus1 life and system, 51
-60: life, 53 f., 60;
writings, 53 f. ; his teach-
ing based on intuition, 54 ;
on his three First Prin-
ciples, 55 ; nature, 56 ;
creation, 56 ; matter, 56 ;
evil, 57 ; psychology and
ethics, 58 ; Ecstasy, 58
Plotinus and later Neoplato-
nist s, 60-76 ; modifications
of his system by lambli-
chus, 65 f. ; by Julian, 69 ;
by Proclus, 74 f.
Plotinus and Christianity,
82-138 : contemporary
Christian Fathers, 77; his
silence with regard to
Christianity, 84, 88-90 ;
Plotinus and Origen, 91-
100 ; on transmigration,
96 ; on evil, 97 ; on the
subordination of the Holy
Spirit, 97-98 ; on the pro-
gress of the soul, 100 ; the
circles addressed by Plo-
tinus and Origen, 103 ; Plo-
tinus and Eusebius, 104 ;
Athanasius, 105 ; Plotinus
and Augustine, 112 — 118;
on the Being of God, 112 ;
the Trinity, H3f.; creation,
115 ; evil, 116-118
Plutarch of Chaeronea, 14, 37
Plutarch of Athens, 74
Porphyry, life of Plotinus, and
Pythagoras, 25 ; pamphlet, 30 ;
editor of the Enneads, 53 ; life
and writings, 60 f. ; attack on
Christianity, 62, 101 ; opposi-
tion to theurgy, 62
Powers, 35
Proclus, 74-76
Protrepticus ; 45
Pythagoras, 25, 38, 48, 6r
Rufinus, 79, 125-127
Sallustius, 71
Septimius Severus, i, 18
Sextus Empiricus, 39
Simplicius, 76
Socrates, 26
Sopater, 68
Speusippus, 29
Stoics, 31, 36, 38, 47
Stromates, 46
Synesius, pupil of Hypatia, 72;
his philosophy, 73 ; conversion
to Christianity, 127; Origenistic
144
INDEX
doctrines, 128 ; Bishop of Ptole- Theophilus of Alexandria, 127 f.
mais, 80, 128 Theurgy, 62
Syrianus, 74
Tacitus, 1 6
TauroboliMm, 1 3
Tertullian, 7, 9, 13, 16, 18, 44
Thales, 22
Themistius, 71
Theodore of Mopsuestia, 79
Theodoret, 79
Theodoric, 135
Theognostus, 121
Theurgy,
Victorinus, 125
World- soul, 55
Xenocrates, 29
Xenophanes, 25
Xenophon, 26
Zeno, 25
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