That did not satisfy its heart. It
had to repeople the spiritual world, which it had emptied of its proper
denizens, with ghosts; to reinvent the old daemonologies and
polytheisms--from thence to descend into lower depths, of which we will
speak hereafter.
But in the meanwhile we must look at another quarrel which arose between
the two twin schools of Alexandria. The Neoplatonists said that there
is a divine element in man. The Christian philosophers assented
fervently, and raised the old disagreeable question: "Is it in every
man? In the publicans and harlots as well as in the philosophers? We
say that it is." And there again the Neoplatonist finds it over hard to
assent to a doctrine, equally contrary to outward appearance, and
galling to Pharisaic pride; and enters into a hundred honest self-
puzzles and self-contradictions, which seem to justify him at last in
saying, No. It is in the philosopher, who is ready by nature, as
Plotinus has it, and as it were furnished with wings, and not needing to
sever himself from matter like the rest, but disposed already to ascend
to that which is above. And in a degree too, it is in the "lover," who,
according to Plotinus, has a certain innate recollection of beauty, and
hovers round it, and desires it, wherever he sees it.
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