Guthrie: Vida de Plotino XXI

XXI. RESULTS OF LONGINUS S CRITICISM AND VINDICATION OF PLOTINOS’S ORIGINALITY.

From the above it will be seen that Plotinos and Amelius are superior to all their contemporaries by the great number of questions they consider, and by the originality of their system; that Plotinos had not ap propriated the opinions of Numenius, and that he did not even follow them; that he had really profited by the opinions of the Pythagoreans (and of Plato) ; further, that he was more precise than Numenius, Cronius, and Thrasyllus. After having said that Amelius followed in the footsteps of Plotinos, but that he was prolix and diffuse in his expositions, which characteristic forms the difference between their styles, he speaks of me, who at that time had known Plotinos for only a short time, and says, “Our mutual friends, Basil (King) of Tyre (Porphyry), who has written much, taking Plotinos as his model.” By that he means that I have avoided the rather unphilosophical diffuseness of Amelius, and have imitated the (concise) style of Plotinos. The quotation of the judgment of this famous man, the first critic of his day, should de cide of the reverence due to our philosopher, Plotinos. If I had been able to visit Longinus when he begged me to do so, he would not have undertaken the refuta tion he wrote, before having clearly understood Plotinos s system.