Page:The Mediaeval Mind Vol 1.djvu/77

CHAP. III is to mark the origin of the intellectual tendencies of the Western Middle Ages, we may at once draw examples from the Latin Fathers. For their views set the forms of mediaeval intellectual interests, and for centuries directed and even limited the mediaeval capacity for apprehending whatever it was given to the Middle Ages to set themselves to know. To pass thus from the East to the West is permissible, since the same pagan cults and modes of thought passed from one boundary of the Empire to the other. Plotinus himself lived and taught in Rome for the last twenty-five years of his life, and there wrote his Enneads in Greek. So on the Christian side, the Catholic Church throughout the East and West presents a solidarity of development, both as to dogma and organization, and also as to popular acceptances.

Let us train our attention upon some points of likeness between Plotinus and St. Augustine. The latter's teachings contain much Platonism; and with this greatest of Latin Fathers, who did not read much Greek, Platonism was inextricably mingled with Neo-Platonism. It is possible to search the works of Augustine and discover this, that, or the other statement reflecting Plato or Plotinus. Yet their most interesting effect on Augustine will not be found in Platonic theorems consciously followed or abjured by the latter. Platonism was "in the air," at least was in the air breathed by an Augustine. Our specific bishop of Hippo knew little of Plato's writings. But Plato had lived: his thoughts had influenced many generations, and in their diffusion had been modified, and had lost many a specific feature. Thereafter Plotinus had constructed Neo-Platonism; that too had permeated the minds of many, itself loosened in the process. These views, these phases of thought and mood, were held or felt by many men, who may not have known their source. And Augustine was not only part of all this, but in mind and temper was Platonically inclined. Thus the most important elements of Platonism and Neo-Platonism in Augustine were his cognate spiritual mood and his attitude toward the world of physical fact.

Note the personal affinity between Augustine and Plotinus.