A Dictionary of Greek and Roman biography and mythology. By various writers. Ed. by William Smith. Illustrated by numerous engravings on wood.

PIROCLUS. JPROCLUS. 535
his will he liberally remembered his slaves. As a existences are connected with the highest only
philosopher he enjoyed the highest celebrity among through the intermediate ones, and can return to
his contemporaries and successors. Marinus does the higher only through that which is internot scruple to call him absolutely inspired, and to mediate. Every multitude, in a certain way, paraffirm that when he uttered his profound dogmas takes of unity, and everything which becomes
his countenance shone with a preternatural light. one, becomes so by partaking of the one. (Jeast.
Besides his other philosophical attainments he was Tseol. 3.) Every object is a union of the one
a distinguished mathematician, astronomer and and the many: that which unites the one and the
grammarian. Cousin considers that all the phi- many is nothing else than the pure, absolute one
losophic rays which ever emanated from the great -the essential one, which makes every thing else
thinkers of Greece, Orpheus, Pythagoras, Plato, partake of unity.
Aristotle, Zeno, Plotinus, &c. were concentrated Proclus argued that there is either one prinin and re-emitted by Proclus (Praef. p. xxvi.). cipium, or many principia. If the latter, the prinSuch laudation is extravagant and absurd. Pro- cipia must be either finite or infinite in number. If
clus was a fanciful speculator, but nothing more, infinite, what is derived from them must be infithough the vagueness and incomprehensibility of nite, so that we should have a double infinite, or
his system may have led some moderns to imagine else, finite. But the finite can be derived only
that they were interpreting Proclus when they from the finite, so that the principia must be finite
were only giving utterance to their own vague spe- in number. There would then be a definite numculations. That Proclus, with all his profundity, ber of them. But number presupposes unity.
wvas utterly destitute of good sense, may be ga- Unity is therefore the principium of principia, a;nd
thered from what Marinas tells of him, that he the cause of the finite multiplicity and of the being
used to say that, if he could have his way, he of all things. (Thleol. Plat. ii. 1.) There is therewould destroy all the writings that were extant, fore on2e principium which is incorporeal, for the
except the oracles and the Timaeus of Plato; as corporeal consists of parts. It is immoveable and
indeed scarcely any other impression is left by the unchangeable, for every thing that moves, moves
whole life which Marinus has written of him. That towards some object or end, which it seeks after.
this want of good sense characterised the school If the principium were moveable it must be in
generally is clear from the fact that as the successor want of the good, and there must be something
of Proclus they could tolerate so very silly a person desirable outside it. But this is impossible, for the
as Marinus. principium has need of nothing, and is itself the
In the writings of Proclus there is a great effort end towards which everything else strives. The
to give an appearance (and it is nothing more) of principium, or first cause of all things, is superior
strict logical connection to the system developed to all actual being (ovlraa), and separated from it,
in them, that form being in his view superior to and cannot even have it as an attribute. (1. c.)
the methods of symbols and images. He professed The absolutely one is not an object of cognition to
that his design was not to bring forward views of any existing thing, nor can it be named (1. c. p.
his own, but simply to expound Plato, in doing 95). But in contemplating the emanation of things
which he proceeded on the idea that everything from the one and their return into it we arrive at
in Plato must be brought into accordance with the two words, the good, and the one, of which the first
mystical theology of Orpheus. He wrote a sepa- is analogical and positive, the latter negative only
rate work on the coincidence of the doctrines of (1. c. p. 96). The absolutely one has produced not
Orpheus, Pythagoras, and Plato. It was in much only earth and heaven, but all the gods which are
the same spirit that he attempted to blend together above the world and in the world: it is the god of all
the logical method of Aristotle and the fanciful gods, the unity of all unities (/. c. ii. p. 110). Everyspeculations of Neoplatonic mysticism. Where rea- thing which is perfect strives to produce something
soning fails him, lie takes refuge in the 7ril'Ors of else, the full seeks to impart its fulness. Still more
Plotinus, which is superior to knowledge, con- must this be the case with the absolute good,
ducting us to the operations of theurgy, which tran- though in connection with that we must not conscends all human wisdom, and comprises within ceive of any creative power or energy, for that
itself all the advantages of divinations, purifica- would be to make the One imperfect and not
tions, initiations, and all the activities of divine simple, not fruitful through its very perfection (I.e.
inspiration. Through it we are united with the p. 101). Every emanation is less perfect than that
primeval unity, in which every motion and energy from which it emanates (Inst. Theol. 7), but has a
of our souls comes to rest. It is this principle certain similarity with it, and, so far as this simiwhich unites not only men with gods, but the larity goes, remains in it, departing from it so far
gods with each other, and with the one, —the as it is unlike, but as far as possible being one with
good, which is of all things the most credible. it, and remaining in it (Inst. Tl/eol. 31). What is
Proclus held, in all its leading features, the doc- produced from the absolutely one is produced as
trine of emanations from one ultimate, primeval unity, or of the nature of unity. Thus the first
principle of all things, the absolute unity, towards produced things are independent unities (aeTroTeunion with which again all things strive. This Ahes evd3es). Of these independent unities some
union he did not, like Plotinus, conceive to be are simple, others more composite. The nearer the
effected by means of pure reason, as even things unities are to the absolute unity the simpler they
destitute of reason and energy participate in it, are, but the greater is the sphere of their operation
purely as the result of their subsistence (ihraprLs, and their productive power. Thus out of unity
71/eol. Plat. i. 25, ii. 1, 4). In some unaccount- there arises a multitude of things which depart farable way, therefore, he must have conceived the ther and farther from the simplicity of the absolute
W7u0'Lr, by which he represents this union as one; and as the producing power diminishes, it inbeing effected, as something which did not in- troduces more and more conditions into things,
volve rational or thinking activity. All inferior while it diminishes their universality and simpliaI am 4