themselves have their origin in Unity; this is the Trinity (Trias) of Plotinus:

208. Pure Intelligence (Novs), is the product and the image of Unity; but inasmuch as it contemplates Unity as its object, it becomes itself the percipient, and is thus distinguished from that which it perceives, or Duplicity. Inasmuch as Intelligence contemplates in Unity that which is possible, the latter acquires the character of something determined and limited; and so becomes the Actual and Real (v). Consequently, Intelligence is the primal reality, the base of all the rest, and inseparably united to real being. The thinking Esse and the Esse thought are identical; and that which Intelligence thinks, it at the same time creates. By always thinking, and always in the same manner, yet continually with some new difference, it produces all things; it is the essence of every imperishable essence: the sum total of infinite life. It comprises all Gods and all Immortal Souls; Perfect Truth and Beauty also belong to it.

209. The Soul (i. e. the Soul of the World), is the offspring of Intelligence, and the thought (oyos) of Intelligence, being itself also productive and creative. It is therefore Intelligence, but with a more obscure vision and less perfect knowledge: inasmuch as it does not itself directly contemplate objects, but through the medium of Intelligence; being endowed with an energetic force which carries its perceptions beyond itself. It is not an original but reflected light, the principal of action, and of external Nature. Its proper activity consists in perception direct from without (Oewpia); and in the production of objects by means of this perception. In this manner it produces, in its turn, different classes of souls, and among others the human; the faculties of which have a tendency to elevation

1 Enn. II, lib. IX, III; lib. V, 3. V; lib. I, 3 et 6; lib. II, I. 2 JOH. HEIM. FEUSTKING, De Tribus Hypostasibus Plotini, Viteb. 1694, 4to, Cf. Dissertations of ROTH and JANUS, quoted § 201.

3 Enn. VI, lib. VIII, 16; Enn. IV, lib. III, 17; Enn. VI, lib. VII, 51; lib. VIII, 16, Enn. V, lib. I, 4, 7; lib. III, 5, 7; lib. V, 2; lib. IX, 5; Enn, VI, lib. VII, 12, 13.

or debasement. The energy of the lowest order, creative, and connected with matter, is Nature (pois).1

210. Nature is a percipient and creative energy, which gives form to matter (oyos Tov); for form (eidosuopon) and thought (Moyos) are one and the same. All that takes place in the world around us is the work of Perception, and for the sake of Perception. Thus from Unity, as from the centre of a circle, are progressively derived Plurality, Divisible Being, and Life; by continued abstraction. In Unity, form and matter are distinguishable; for it is Form that fashions; which supposes something capable of receiving a determinate impression.3

211. Form and Matter, Soul and Body, are inseparable. There never was a time when the universe was not animated; but as we can conceive it not to have been so, the question suggests itself: What is matter; and how was it produced by Unity (since the latter is the principle of all Reality ?) Matter is real, but devoid of Form; it is indeterminateness, capable of receiving a form, and stands in the same relation to it as shade to light. Unity, as being the cause of Reality, continually progresses from itself as a centre; and following this progressive scale of production to the end, we arrive at a final product, beyond which no other is possible; an ultimate term whence nothing can proceed, and which ceases to retain any portion of unity or perfection. The Soul, by its progressive intuitional and sensational perception, which is at the same time production also, creates for itself the scene of its action; that is, Space, and therewith Time also.* The Soul is a light kindled by Intelligence, and shedding its rays within certain limits, beyond which is night and darkness. It contemplates this darkness, and gives it a form, from its own incapability of enduring any thing unimpressed by Thought; and thus out of darkness it creates for itself a beautiful and diversified habitation, inseparable from the cause which produced it; in other words it bestows on itself a body.*

1 Enn. V, lib. I, 6, 7; lib. VI, 4; Enn. VI, lib. II, 22.

2 Enn. III, lib. VIII. 3 Enn. II, lib. IV, 14; Enn. III. lib. VI, 7. * An analogous but not identical system of Mystical Idealism has been reproduced in Germany by the School of Schelling.-ED.

* Enn. I, lib. VIII, 7; Enn. III, lib. IV, 2; Enn. II, lib. III, IV.

Since all Reality is present in the Intelligence in an eternal way, Plotinus draws a distinction between intelligible and sensational Matter. He appears sometimes to regard unformed or rude matter as a product of the mind, but through an imperfection in its operations: supposing the mind while occupied in creation to have been sometimes carried out of itself, without fixing its view on the First and Perfect Principle; and consequently becoming liable to indeterminateness. At other times he speaks of unformed matter as possessed of reality, but not derived from the Soul.2

212. There is an Intellectual World as well as a World of Sense (νοητὸς καὶ αἰσθητὸς κόσμος): the latter is but the image of the former, and hence their perfect accordance. The intellectual world is a Whole, Invariable, Absolute, Living; Undivided in point of space; Unchangeable through time: it is Unity in Plurality and Plurality in Unity, like Science (the spiritual world.) Indeterminateness exists even in the Intellectual world: the greater the distance from True Being the greater the degree of Indeterminate

ness.

In the Sensible World, (the reflection of the former), are plants, the earth, rocks, fire, etc.-all of them endued with life; for the World itself is an animated Idea. Fire, air, and water are ideas endowed with life: a Soul inhabiting Matter, as a creative principle (hylozoism).

Nothing in Nature is devoid of Reason: even the inferior animals possess it, but in a different degree from man.3

213. Every object possesses Unity and Multiplicity. To the Body belongs Multiplicity, divisible with reference to Space. The Soul is an essence devoid of extent, immaterial, and simple in its nature; without body; or with a body which has two natures, the superior one indivisible: the inferior divisible. To each of these he assigns three forces. Souls descend from the Intellectual to the Sensational world. Their union with the Body is a Fall from the perfect and happy state.

Plotinus states very ably the metaphysical arguments for the immateriality and immortality of the Soul: but at 2 Enn. III, lib. VIII, 1.

1 Enn. I, lib. VIII, 3, 4.

3. Enn. IV, lib. IV, VIII, IX; Enn. VI, lib. IV, VII.

the same time gives rise to extravagant imaginations in his dreams respecting the union of the immaterial element with the corporeal substance.1

214. Every thing that takes place is the result of Necessity, and of a principle identified with all its consequences; (in this we see the rudiments of Spinozism, and the Theodicé of Leibnitz). All things are connected together by a perpetual dependency; (a system of universal Determinism, from which there is only one exception, and that rather apparent than real, of Unity). Out of this concatenation of things arise the principles of natural Magic and Divination." As for the existence of Evil in the external world, Plotinus considers it to be sometimes an unavoidable but necessary negation of good, at others, something positive: such as Matter, Body; and, in this latter particular, sometimes as being external to the soul, and the cause of imperfection in its productions; sometimes as seated within the soul, as its imperfect product. In this manner he falls into the very fault which he urges against the Gnostics. He is also led to adopt a system of Optimism and Fatalism, adverse to Morality;5 though occasionally he admits that moral Evil is voluntary, and the author of it accountable."

215. Unity (the Divinity) being Perfection itself, is the end and object of all things, which derive from him their nature and their being; and which cannot become perfect but through him. The Human Soul cannot attain perfection or felicity but by the intuition of the Supreme Unity, by means of an absolute abstraction (arλwois, simplification) from all compound things, and by absorption into pure Esse. In this consists Virtue, which is twofold: Inferior Virtue, comprising the so-called cardinal virtues, (or Toλtiký), belonging to such souls as are in the progress of purification; and Superior Virtue, which consists in an intimate union, by intuition, with the Divine Being (evwois). Its source

Enn. IV, lib. I, II, III, VI.

3 Enn. VI, lib. VII, 8-10; Enn. IV, lib. IV, 4, 5; Enn. VII, lib. II, 3.

3 Enn. III, lib. II, 16; Enn. IV, lib. IV, 32. 40.

Enn. I, lib. VIII; Enn. II, lib. IX; Enn. III, lib. II. 5 Enn. I, lib. VIII, 5; Enn. III, lib. II, 18.

6 Enn. III, lib. II, 9, 10.

:

is the Divinity himself, throngh the medium of light and heat. The Soul acquires from its intuition of Divine beauty a similar grace; and derives warmth from the celestial fire.1

216. This system is built on two principles unsupported by proof. These are: 1st. That the Absolute and Universal, which is inaccessible to the senses, is the Principle of the Universe, and may be recognised as such: 2dly. That it can be known by means of an intellectual intuition and perception, superior in its nature to Thought itself. Plotinus represents Thought as intuition and perception, transforms Philosophy into Poetry, and the pure form of our conceptions into substantial objects. His doctrine is a transcendant Mysticism containing some Platonic notions, and elicited by the enthusiasm prevalent in that age. Neglecting the question of possibilities, his philosophy proceeds at once to the cognition of the absolute and complete theory of universal knowledge. At the same time it certainly contains several valuable hints respecting our faculties for acquiring knowledge, and some elevated thoughts, which have been borrowed and improved by other philosophers. It acquired the highest popularity, principally because it derived knowledge from a source superior to the senses; and owing to its doctrine of a Triad, and the relation it supposes between it and the external world: and in short was considered a complete exposition of the theory of the Great Plato: of that Plato whom men began now to consider divinely inspired. Next came the attempt to prove the correspondence of Plato's system with those anterior doctrines whence he was supposed to have derived so many of his own: viz. of Pythagoras, Orpheus, Zoroaster, and Hermes; and they were not long without apocryphal books also, attributed to the same, to substantiate this notion. They went farther, and desired to prove a like correspondence between Plato and his successors, particularly Aristotle. All these attempts, which were inconsistent with a truly philosophical spirit, did but foster the prevailing taste of the age for superstition and mystical exaggeration. (Magic and Divination, etc.).

1 Enn. I, lib. II, VIII, 13; Enn. VI, lib. VII, c. 22; lib, IX, 9—11. 2 PROCLI Theol. Platonis, lib. 1, c. 1.