in the later Neoplatonists. Porphyry, before he became a disciple of
Plotinus, wrote a book [Greek: peri tes eklogion philosophia]; as a
philosopher he no longer required the "[Greek: logia]." But the later
representatives of the system sought for their philosophy revelations of
the Godhead. They found them in the religious traditions and cults of
all nations. Neoplatonism learned from the Stoics to rise above the
political limits of nations and states, and to widen the Hellenic
consciousness to a universally human one. The spirit of God has breathed
throughout the whole history of the nations, and the traces of divine
revelation are to be found everywhere. The older a religious tradition
or cultus is, the more worthy of honour, the more rich in thoughts of
God it is. Therefore the old Oriental religions are of special value to
the Neoplatonists. The allegorical method of interpreting myths, which
was practised by the Stoics in particular, was accepted by Neoplatonism
also. But the myths, spiritually explained, have for this system an
entirely different value from what they had for the Stoic philosophers.
The latter adjusted themselves to the myths by the aid of allegorical
explanation; the later Neoplatonists, on the other hand, (after a
selection in which the immoral myths were sacrificed, see, e.g. Julian)
regarded them as _the proper material and sure foundation of
philosophy_. Neoplatonism claims to be not only the absolute
_philosophy_, completing all systems, but, at the same time, the
absolute _religion_, confirming and explaining all earlier religions. A
rehabilitation of all ancient religions is aimed at (see the philosophic
teachers of Julian and compare his great religious experiment); each was
to continue in its traditional form, but, at the same time, each was to
communicate the religious temper and the religious knowledge which
Neoplatonism had attained, and each cultus is to lead to the high
morality which it behoves man to maintain. In Neoplatonism the
psychological fact of the longing of man for something higher, is
exalted to the all-predominating principle which explains the world.
Therefore the religions, though they are to be purified and
spiritualised, become the foundation of philosophy. The Neoplatonic
philosophy therefore presupposes the religious syncretism of the third
century, and cannot be understood without it. The great forces which
were half unconsciously at work in this syncretism, were