[Footnote 143: Heb. viii. 5.]
[Footnote 144: Enn. iii. 8. 4, [Greek: hotan asthenêsôsin eis to theôrein, skian theôrias kai logou tên praxin poiountai]. Cf. Amiel's Journal, p. 4, "action is coarsened thought.">[
[Footnote 145: Enn. iii. 2. 15, [Greek: hypokriseis] and [Greek: paignion]; and see iv. 3. 32, on love of family and country.]
[Footnote 146: Enn. vi. 7. 34.]
[Footnote 147: It would be an easy and rather amusing task to illustrate these and other aberrations of speculative Mysticism from Herbert Spencer's philosophy. E.g., he says that, though we cannot know the Absolute, we may have "an indefinite consciousness of it." "It is impossible to give to this consciousness any qualitative or quantitative expression whatever," and yet it is quite certain that we have it. Herbert Spencer's Absolute is, in fact, matter without form. This would seem to identify it rather with the all but non-existing "matter" of Plotinus (see Bigg, Neoplatonism, p. 199), than with the superessential "One"; but the later Neoplatonists found themselves compelled to call both extremes [Greek: to mê on]. Plotinus struggles hard against this conclusion, which threatens to make shipwreck of his Platonism. "Hierotheus," whose sympathies are really with Indian nihilism, welcomes it.]
[Footnote 148: The following advice to directors, quoted by Ribet, may be added: "Director valde attendat ad personas languidæ valetudinis. Si tales personæ a Deo in quamdam quietis orationem eleventur, contingit ut in omnibus exterioribus sensibus certum defectum ac speciem quamdam deliquii experiantur cum magna interna suavitate, quod extasim aut raptum esse facillime putant. Cum Dei Spiritui resistere nolint, deliquio illi totas se tradunt, et per multas horas, cum gravissimo valetudinis præiudicio in tali mentis stupiditate persistunt." Genuine ecstasy, according to these authorities, seldom lasted more than half an hour, though one Spanish writer speaks of an hour.]
[Footnote 149: Mrs. Humphry Ward's translation, p. 72.]
[Footnote 150: But we should not forget that the author of the Epistle to Diognetus speaks of the Logos as [Greek: pantote neos en hagiôn kardiais gennômenos]. In St. Augustine we find it in a rather surprisingly bold form; cf. in Joh. tract. 21, n. 8: "Gratulemur et grates agamus non solum nos Christianos factos esse, sed Christum … Admiramini, gaudete: Christus facti sumus." But this is really quite different from saying, "Ego Christus factus sum.">[
[Footnote 151: "Greek" must here be taken to include the Hellenised Jews. Those who are best qualified to speak on Jewish philosophy believe that it exercised a strong influence at Alexandria.]
[Footnote 152: Proclus used to say that a philosopher ought to show no exclusiveness in his worship, but to be the hierophant of the whole world. This eclecticism was not confined to cultus.]