PLOTINUS. 



BORN A. C. 205, DIED A. C. 270. 



THE history of ancient philosophy may be divided into the age of 

 invention and the age of illustration: the one gave birth to those 

 earlier speculations, in which, amid all their incompleteness, the stamp 

 of original genius is of too bold and brilliant a cast to be mistaken: 

 the other was marked by general attempts to explain, to methodize, 

 to expand, or to modify existing theories. In this latter period arose 

 the singular system, or, more properly speaking, combination of 

 systems, which forms the subject of the present rapid sketch. 



Dogmatism, as we have already remarked, had produced, by a Rise of 

 reaction natural to the human mind, its opposite, Pyrrhonism. 1 But Ecle ' 

 the state of universal doubt into which many of the philosophers, who 

 flourished in the first ages of the Christian era, had been thrown, was 

 too unnatural to be long held even in theory, much less to be practised 

 in the conduct of life. A desire, therefore, was soon felt to reject the 

 most objectionable, and to select the most excellent, doctrines of the 

 various schools, which divided the philosophic world in general, and 

 Alexandria, the seat of motley disputants of all countries and characters, 

 in particular. This amalgamation of dogmas was calculated to pro- 

 mote many objects. It associated the traditions of the East with the 

 method of the Greeks ; and, as a consequence of this union, 2 the reli- 

 gious enthusiasm with which the Oriental spirit was deeply imbued, 

 infused itself into every part of the new philosophy. Hence it dis- 

 guised by allegorical ingenuity the deformities of polytheism, and 

 borrowed many of the peculiarities of the Christian ethics, which were 

 gradually imparting a more elevated tone to the morals of the time. 

 Hence, too, it was distinguished by the vehemence with which, 

 breaking beyond the limited range of reason into the mystical contem- 

 plation of abstract truths, it sought, in process of time, supernatural 

 aid from the arts of theurgy. 3 In this manner arose the school com- 



1 See above, SEXTUS EMPIRICUS. 



2 Cousin, Cours de 1'Hist. de la Philosoph. torn. i. p. 317. 



3 M. Degerando looks upon the school of the new Platonists as dividing itself 

 into three branches : the school of Rome, that of Alexandria, that of Athens. In 

 the first, the chiefs are Plotinus and Porphyry ; in the second, Jamblicus and 

 Hierocles; in the third, Plutarch and Syrianus : it .is represented to us by Proclus, 

 the only one well known to us. Ammonias Saccas is the common source. The 

 School of Rome has this distinctive character, that it is essentially a philosophical 

 eclecticism ; that it shows itself but little tinctured with Oriental traditions ; that 

 it does not yet invoke the services of the ancient mythology. The School of Alex- 



