If Clement had asked the Neoplatonists: "You believe, Plotinus, in an
absolutely Good Being. Do you believe that it desires to shed forth its
goodness on all?" "Of course," they would have answered, "on those who
seek for it, on the philosopher."
"But not, it seems, Plotinus, on the herd, the brutal, ignorant mass,
wallowing in those foul crimes above which you have risen?" And at that
question there would have been not a little hesitation. These brutes in
human form, these souls wallowing in earthly mire, could hardly, in the
Neoplatonists' eyes, be objects of the Divine desire.
"Then this Absolute Good, you say, Plotinus, has no relation with them,
no care to raise them. In fact, it cannot raise them, because they have
nothing in common with it. Is that your notion?" And the Neoplatonists
would have, on the whole, allowed that argument. And if Clement had
answered, that such was not his notion of Goodness, or of a Good Being,
and that therefore the goodness of their Absolute Good, careless of the
degradation and misery around it, must be something very different from
his notions of human goodness; the Neoplatonists would have answered--
indeed they did answer--"After all, why not? Why should the Absolute
Goodness be like our human goodness?" This is Plotinus's own belief.
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