own as their efficient cause their objects (ideata) or the things perceived, but God himself in so far as he is a thinking thing.”[1]
Stated simply the parallel just drawn is this: the Neoplatonists, Spinoza and Mrs. Eddy all agree in the view that the ideas of the human mind are caused by the divine mind and are really divine ideas. It will be recalled that we proved that Spinoza and Mrs. Eddy deny free agency to man and also affirm his divinity. The logical consistency of Christian Science and Spinozaism as determined by Neoplatonism is beautiful.
This is a good place to explain a difference between the psychology of the Neoplatonists and that of Mrs. Eddy. The Neoplatonists following Plato recognized three distinct kinds of knowledge, while Mrs. Eddy recognizes only two. After sensation, which both reject as not belonging really to the category of knowledge, the Neoplatonists would put in the first class such mental activities or states as imagination, memory, and opinion or belief; in the second class discursive reason; in the third and highest class, intellectual consciousness or intuition. This theory of knowledge has had a mighty influence upon the world. It gave to the “old” psychology its general character and is related to the trichotomous theory of human nature.
The metaphysical basis for this psychology is the theory of the existence of three hypostases or principles, mind, soul and matter. In mind which
- ↑ Eth. 2. 5.
