NEOPLATONISTS, the name given to an illustrious succession of ancient philoso phers who claim to found their doctrines and speculations on those of Plato. Strictly ;peaking, however, the Platonic philosophy—that is, in its original and genuine form— aspired with Plato's immediate disciples, Speusippus and Xenocrates. Arcesilaus (q.v.). .he founder of the new academy, and at a later period Carneades (q.v.), introduced and Effused a skeptical Probabilism, which gradually destroyed that earnest and reverent spirit of intellectual inquiry so characteristic of the great pupil of Socrates. The course of polti!cal events in the ancient world also largely assisted in bringing about the same result. The. triumphs of the Roman power had been accomplished at the expense of national liberties, and had issued in a general deterioration of moral character, both in the cast and the west. Public Inca, especially, sought., above all things, material gratifi cations, and canto to look upon philosophy itself as only a more exquisite kind of luxury. It was quite natural, therefore, that skepticism and eclecticism should become the preva lent forms of philosophy, Besides, the speculations of the older philosophers were felt to lie unsatisfactory. When men began to review the long succession of contradic tory or divergent systems that had prevailed since the time of Thales the Milesian, in the gray dawn of Greek history, a suspicion appears to have sprung up that reality, cer tainty, truth, was either not attainable, or could only be attained by selecting something from every system. 'Moreover. the immensely extended intercourse of nations, itself a result of Boman conquest, had brought into the closest proximity a crowd of conflicting opinions, beliefs, and practices, which could not help occasionally undergoing a con fused amalgamation, and in this way presented to view a practical eclecticism, less refined and philosophical indeed than the speculative systems of the day, but not essen tially different from them. This tendency to amalgamation showed itself most proud newly in Alexandria. Placed at the junction of two continents, Asia and Africa, and close to the most cultivated and intellectual regions of Europe, that celebrated naturally became a focus for the chief religions and philosophies of the ancient world. Here, the cast and the west, Greek culture and oriental enthusiasm, met and mingled; and here, too. Christianity sought a home. and ,:trove to quell, by the liberality of its sympathies, the myriad discords of paganism. "Greek skepticism," says Mr. Lewes, "Judaism, Platonism, Christianity—all had their interpreters within a small distance of the temple of Serapis." It is not wonderful, therefore, that a philosophy, which so dis tinctly combines the peculiar mental characteristics of the east and the west, as that pro mulgated by the Neoplatonists, should have originated in .Alexandria. Yet, at the same time, it is but right to notice, as does M. Matter in his .1ItStoire de 1 'Ecole &Alexandra', that it soon ceased to have any local connection with the city. Its most illustrious repre sentatives were neither natives of Alexandria, nor members of the famous museum, and they had their schools elsewhere—in Rome, in Athens, and in Asia.
It is not, easy to say with whom Neoplatonism commenced. Scholars differ as to how
much should be included tinder that term. By some it is used to designate the whole new intellectual movement proceeding from Alexandria, comprising, in this broad the philosophy, 1st, of Philo-Judieus and of Xumenius the Syrian; 2d, of the Chris tian fathers (Clemens Alexandrinus, Origen, etc.); 3d, of the gnostics; and 4th, of Ammo nius Saceas and his suteesSOfs Others, -again, would exclude the second of these (though the Alexandrian diVities frequently Platonize); While a third party is disposed to restrict the application of the term to the fourth. The last of these modes of regard ing Neoplatonisin is the one most current, and is perhaps the most convenient and defi nite: vet Bouterwek, Tennemann- Lewes, etc., agree in considering Philo.Judiuus (q.v.) an Alexandrian Jew, and (in part) contemporary of Jesus Christ, as the first of the Neo platonists—that is to say, as the first, who endeavored to unite the mysteries of oriental belief with the dialectics and speculations of the Platonists. A similar course was at least partially pursued by the Christian fathers of Alexandria, partly from a predilec tion for the philosophy in which they had been reared, and partly from a desire to har monize reason and faith, and to make their religion acceptable to thoughtful and educated pagans; hence, they too may, not without reason, he classed along with Philo, though their spirit and aim are distinctively and even strongly Christian. In gnosticism, on the other hand. speaking generally, the lawless mysticism of the east predominated, and we see little either of the spirit or logic of Plato. They may, therefore, be dismissed from the category of Neoplatonists. Ilegarding Philo-Judiens and the Alexandrian divines, it must be noticed that they wrote and taught in the interests of their own religion, and had no idea of defending or propagating a heathen philosophy. It is this which strik ingly distinguishes them from the school founded by Ammonius Saccas, and also from an independent group of pagan teachers and authors who likewise flourished in the first and second centuries after Christ, and whose main object was to popularize and diffuse the ethics and religio-philosophic system of Plato, by allegorically explaining the ancient mysteries of the popular belief in harmony with the ideas of their master, but, at the stone time, blending with these many Pythagorean and Aristotelian notions. The best known names of this group are Plutarch (q.v.) and Appulcius (q.v.). These men have a better claim to the• title of Neoplatonists than any of the others. They adhered far more closely to their great master, and were, in fact—to the best of their ability—simply popular expounders of his philosophy. Living at a time when paganism was in a mori bund condition, they sought to revive, purify, and elevate the faith in which their fathers had lived. Christianity, a young, vigorous, and hostile system, was rooting itself in the hearts of men deeper and deeper every day, and these disciples of Plato— tenderly attached to their ancestral religion—felt that something must b e done to pre. serve from going out the fires that were feebly burning on the altars of the ancient gods.