Plotinos says that it would be a poor artist who would conceive of
an animal as all covered with eyes. There is hardly such a reference
outside of Revelations,[531] to which we must also look for a new
heaven and a new earth.[532] Then we have practically a quotation of
the Johannine prologue "In the beginning was the Logos," and by him
were all things made.[533] Light was in the beginning.[534] We are told
not to leave the world, but not to be of it.[535] The divinity prepares
mansions in heaven for good souls.[536]
Pauline references seem to be that sin exists because of the law.[537]
God is above all height or depth.[538] The vulgar who attend
mystery-banquets only to gorge are condemned.[539] There are several
heavens.[540] The beggarly principles and elements towards which some
turn, are mentioned.[541] The genealogies of the Gnostics are held up
to ridicule.[542] General references are numerous. Diseases are caused
by evil spirits.[543] We must cut off any offending member.[544] Thus
we are saved.[545] In him we breathe and move and have our being.[546]
The higher divinity begets a Son, one among many brethren.[547] As the
father of intelligence, God is the father of lights.[548]
However, the most interesting incident is that scriptural text which,
to the reflecting, is always so much of a puzzle: "If the light that
is in them be darkness," etc.[549] This is explained by the Platonic
theory[550] that we see because of a special light that is within the
eye.