[515] Enn., V., vii., I, p. 539, B. (Kirchh., I., p. 145, l. 23).
[516] For references, see Zeller, pp. 588 ff.
[517] Enn., VI., ii., 3, p. 598, A. (Kirchh., II., p. 227).
[518] Enn., II., ix.
[519] Ibid., cap. 6.
[520] Ibid., 14.
[521] Enn., II., ix., 15.
[522] Kirchner, Die Ph. d. Plot., pp. 1-24, 175-208. Cp. Steinhart, Meletemata Plotiniana, p. 4.
[523] Two other popular misconceptions may be traced back, in part at least, to the exclusively transcendental interpretation of Plato’s philosophy. By drawing away attention from the Socratic dialogues, it broke the connexion between Socrates and his chief disciple, thus leaving the former to be estimated exclusively from Xenophon’s view of his character as a moral and religious teacher. True, Xenophon himself supplies us with the data which prove that Socrates was, above all things, a dialectician, but only in the reflex light of Plato’s subsequent developments can their real significance be perceived. On the other hand, the attempt to combine Aristotle with Plato led to a serious misunderstanding of the actual relation between the two. When the whole ideal element of his philosophy had been drawn off and employed to heighten still further the transcendentalism of his master’s teaching, the Stagirite came to be judged entirely by the residual elements, by the logical, physical, and critical portions of his system. On the strength of these, he was represented as the type of whatever is most opposed to Plato, and, in particular, of a practical, prosaic turn of mind, which was quite alien from his true character.
[524] Χαλεπὸν μὲν γνωσθῆναι ... γιγνωσκόμενον δὲ μᾶλλον τῷ ἀπ’ αὐτοῦ γεννήματι τῇ οὐσίᾳ. (Enn., VI., ix., 5, p. 763, B.) Πᾶν τὸ θεῖον αὐτὸ μὲν διὰ τὴν ὑπερούσιον ἕνωσιν ἄρρητόν ἐστι καὶ ἄγνωστον πᾶσι τοῖς δευτέροις· ἀπὸ δὲ τῶν μετεχόντων ληπτόν ἐστι καὶ γνωστόν. (Proclus, Institutiones Theologicae, cxxiii.), cp. Proclus, ibid., clxii.