ABSTRACT
In this chapter, the author shows that in speaking of a ‘Neo-neo-Platonism’ he wish to imply both that Plotinus and Proclus understood Plato very deeply, far more deeply, in fact, than those who erect their own incapacity for system and their horror of mysticism and metaphysics into philosophical virtues. The basic strength of Platonism lies, however, in its appeal to our imagination, our understanding and our sense of values. The ontology of Platonism is therefore an ontology of a thinly spread system of prime patterns, with a less confidently accepted set of interstitial patterns which deviate from these first and which are held in place by them. In Platonism there is plainly a certain necessity in the procession of ‘lower’ principles from ‘higher’ ones: there is a certain generosity in the higher genera, a freedom from ‘envy’, which ensures their communication to lower orders of half-being.
