As a "Concluding Part" to "The Myths of Plato," Professor J.A. Stewart
wrote a chapter on the Cambridge Platonists of the seventeenth century, his
object being to show that the thought of Plato "has been, and still is, an
important influence in modern philosophy."
It was a not unnatural reaction that diverted the scholars of the
Renaissance from Aristotle to Plato. The medieval Church had been
Aristotelian, and "antagonism to the Roman Church had, doubtless, much to
do with the Platonic revival, which spread from Italy to Cambridge." But,
curiously enough, the Plato whom Cambridge served was not Plato the
Athenian dialectician, but Plato the poet and allegorist. It was, in fact,
Philo, the Jew, rather than Plato, the Greek, that inspired them.
"Philo never thought of doubting that Platonism and the Jewish Scriptures
had real affinity to each other, and hardly perhaps asked himself how the
affinity was to be accounted for." Philo, however, would have had no
difficulty in accounting for it; already in his day the quaint theory was
prevalent that Athens had borrowed its wisdom from Jerusalem. The
Cambridge Platonists went with Philo in declaring Plato to be "the Attic
Moses." Henry More (1662) maintained strongly Plato's indebtedness to
Moses; even Pythagoras was so indebted, or, rather, "it was a common fame
[report] that Pythagoras was a disciple of the Prophet Ezekiel." The
Cambridge Platonists were anxious, not only to show this dependence of
Greek upon Hebraic thought, but they went on to argue that Moses taught,
in allegory, the natural philosophy of Descartes. More calls Platonism
the soul, and Cartesianism the body, of his own philosophy, which he
applies to the explanation of the Law of Moses. "This philosophy is the
old Jewish-Pythagorean Cabbala, which teaches the motion of the Earth and
Pre-existence of the Soul." But it is awkward that Moses does not teach
the motion of the earth. More is at no loss; he boldly argues that,
though "the motion of the earth has been lost and appears not in the
remains of the Jewish Cabbala, this can be no argument against its once
having been a part thereof." He holds it as "exceedingly probable" that
the Roman Emperor "Numa was both descended from the Jews and imbued with
the Jewish religion and learning."
Thus the Cambridge Platonists of the seventeenth century are a very
remarkable example of the recurrent influence exercised on non-Jews by
certain forms of Judaism that had but slight direct effect on the Jews
themselves. Indirectly, the Hellenic side of Jewish culture left its mark,
especially in the Cabbala. It would be well worth the while of a Jewish
theologian to make a close study of the seventeenth century alumni of
Cambridge, who were among the most fascinating devotees of ancient Jewish
wisdom. Henry More was particularly attractive, "the most interesting and
the most unreadable of the whole band." When he was a young boy, his uncle
had to threaten a flogging to cure him of precocious "forwardness in
philosophizing concerning the mysteries of necessity and freewill." In 1631
he entered Christ's College, Cambridge, "about the time when John Milton
was leaving it," and he may almost be said to have spent the rest of his
life within the walls of the college, "except when he went to stay with his
'heroine pupil,' Anne, Viscountess Conway, at her country seat of Ragley in
Warwickshire, where his pleasure was to wander among the woods and glades."
He absolutely refused all preferment, and when "he was once persuaded to
make a journey to Whitehall, to kiss His Majesty's hands, but heard by the
way that this would be the prelude to a bishopric, he at once turned back."
Yet More was no recluse. "He had many pupils at Christ's; he loved music,
and used to play on the theorbo; he enjoyed a game at bowls, and still more
a conversation with intimate friends, who listened to him as to an oracle;
and he was so kind to the poor that it was said his very chamber-door was a
hospital for the needy." But enough has been quoted from Overton's
biography to whet curiosity about this Cambridge sage and saint. More well
illustrates what was said above (pp. 114-116)--the man of letters is truest
to his calling when he has at the same time an open ear to the call of
humanity.