It is in the activities of men that the evils appear, and that not of all men nor always. And as to these, if men sinned for the sake of evil, nature itself would be evil. But if the adulterer thinks his adultery bad but his pleasure good, and the murderer thinks the murder bad but the money he gets by it good, and the man who does evil to an enemy thinks that to do evil is bad but to punish his enemy good, and if the soul commits all its sins in that way, then the evils are done for the sake of goodness. The soul sins therefore because, while aiming at good, it makes mistakes about the good, because it is not primary essence. And we see many things done by the Gods to prevent it from making mistakes and to heal it when it has made them. Arts and sciences, curses and prayers, sacrifices and initiations, laws and constitutions, judgments and punishments, all came into existence for the sake of preventing souls from sinning; and when they are gone forth from the body, Gods and spirits of purification cleanse them of their sins.

Sallust, On the Gods and the World

The word philosophy means “love of wisdom.” A love of wisdom should be your motivation - not escape from feelings, not cool mystical experiences, not some kind of status as an intellectual, not your political opinions. If you are not motivated by a love for wisdom, you are walking down the wrong path.

Since Evil is here, ‘haunting this world by necessary law’, and it is the Soul’s design to escape from Evil, we must escape hence.

But what is this escape?

‘In attaining Likeness to God’, we read. And this is explained as ‘becoming just and holy, living by wisdom’, the entire nature grounded in Virtue.

But does not Likeness by way of Virtue imply Likeness to some being that has Virtue? To what Divine Being, then, would our Likeness be? To the Being - must we not think? - in Which, above all, such excellence seems to inhere, that is to the Soul of the Cosmos and to the Principle ruling within it, the Principle endowed with a wisdom most wonderful. What could be more fitting than that we, living in this world, should become Like to its ruler?

Plotinus, Ennead 1.2.1

Never say of anything, "I have lost it"; but, "I have returned it." Is your child dead? It is returned. Is your wife dead? She is returned. Is your estate taken away? Well, and is not that likewise returned? "But he who took it away is a bad man." What difference is it to you who the giver assigns to take it back? While he gives it to you to possess, take care of it; but don't view it as your own, just as travelers view a hotel.

Epictetus, The Handbook 11

In fact, you see, none of the gods loves wisdom or wants to become wise - for they are wise - and no one else who is wise already loves wisdom; on the other hand, no one who is ignorant will love wisdom either or want to become wise. For what’s especially difficult about being ignorant is that you are content with yourself, even though you’re neither beautiful and good nor intelligent. If you don’t think you need anything, of course you won’t want what you don’t think you need.

Plato, Symposium, 204a

Socrates: Let us proceed by taking up this question.
Protarchus: What question?
Socrates: Whether we hold the view that the universe and this whole world order are ruled by unreason and irregularity, as chance would have it, or whether they are not rather, as our forebears taught us, governed by reason and by the order of a wonderful intelligence.
Protarchus: How can you even think of a comparison here, Socrates? What you suggest now is downright impious, I would say. The only account that can do justice to the wonderful spectacle presented by the cosmic order of sun, moon, and stars and the revolution of the whole heaven, is that reason arranges it all, and I for my part would never waver in saying or believing it.

Plato, Philebus, 28d-e

Now why did he who framed this whole universe of becoming frame it? Let us state the reason why: He was good, and one who is good can never become jealous of anything. And so, being free of jealousy, he wanted everything to become as much like himself as was possible. In fact, men of wisdom will tell you (and you couldn't do better than to accept their claim) that this, more than anything else, was the most preeminent reason for the origin of the world's coming to be. The god wanted everything to be good and nothing to be bad so far as that was possible, and so he took over all that was visible - not at rest but in discordant and disorderly motion - and brought it from a state of disorder to one of order, because he believed that order was in ever way better than disorder. Now it wasn't permitted (nor is it now) that one who is supremely good should do anything but what is best. Accordingly, the god reasoned and concluded that in the realm of things naturally visible no unintelligent thing could as a whole be better than anything which does possess intelligence as a whole, and he further concluded that it is impossible for anything to come to possess intelligence apart from soul. Guided by the reasoning, he put intelligence in soul, and soul in body, and so he constructed the universe. He wanted to produce a piece of work that would be as excellent and supreme as its nature would allow. This, then, in keeping with our likely account, is how we must say divine providence brought our world into being as a truly living thing, endowed with soul and intelligence.

Plato, Timaeus, 29e-30b

Many statements of Socrates would serve as excellent prayers or mantras. For example:

"May it be for the best. If it so pleases the gods, so be it." - Crito, 43d

Now, all that is good is beautiful, and what is beautiful is not ill-proportioned. Hence we must take it that if a living thing is to be in good condition, it will be well-proportioned. … In determining health and disease or virtue and vice no proportion or lack of it is more important than that between soul and body – yet we do not think about any of them nor do we realize that when a vigorous and excellent soul is carried about by a too frail and puny frame, or when the two are combined in the opposite way, the living thing as a whole lacks beauty, because it is lacking in the most important of proportions. That living thing, however, which finds itself in the opposite condition is, for those who are able to observe it, the most beautiful, the most desirable of all things to behold. … From both of these conditions [of ill-proportion between soul and body] there is in fact one way to preserve oneself, and that is not to exercise the soul without exercising the body, nor the body without the soul, so that each may be balanced by the other and so be sound. The mathematician, then, or the ardent devotee of any other intellectual discipline should also provide exercise for his body by taking part in gymnastics, while one who takes care to develop his body should in his turn practice the exercises of the soul by applying himself to the arts and to every pursuit of wisdom, if he is to truly deserve the joint epithets of “fine and good.”

Plato, Timaeus, 87c - 88c

Most honored of immortals, many-named one, ever omnipotent,
Zeus, prime mover of nature, steering all things by your law,
Hail!
For it is proper for all mortals to speak to you:
For we all descend from you, bearing our share of your likeness
We alone, of all mortal creatures that live and move on earth.
So, I shall make song of you constantly and sing forever of your might.
Truly, this whole universe, spinning around the earth,
Obeys you wherever you lead, and willingly submits to your rule;
Such is the servant you hold in your unconquerable hands,
A double-edged, fiery, ever-living thunderbolt.
For by its strikes all the works of nature happen.
By it you direct the universal reason, which pervades all things
Intermixing with the great and small lights of the heavens.
Because of this you are the greatest, the highest ruler of all.
Not a single thing that is done on earth happens without you, God,
Nor in the divine heavenly sphere nor in the sea,
Except for what bad people do in their foolishness.
But you know how to make the crooked straight
And to bring order to the disorderly; even the unloved is loved by you.
For you have so joined all things into one, the good and the bad,
That they all share in a single unified everlasting reason.

It is shirked and avoided by all the wicked among mortals,
The wretched, who ever long for the getting of good things,
Neither see nor hear God’s universal law,
By which, obeying with understanding, they could share in the good life.
But instead they chase after this and that, far from the good,
Some in their aggressive zeal for fame,
Others with a disordered obsession with profits,
Still others in indulgence and the pleasurable exertions of the body.
[They desire the good] but are carried off here and there,
All the while in zealous pursuit of completely different outcomes.
But bountiful Zeus, shrouded in dark clouds and ruling the thunder,
Protect human beings from their ruinous ignorance;
Scatter it from our souls, grant that we might obtain
True judgment on which you rely to steer all things with justice;

So that having won honor, we may honor you in return,
Constantly singing of your works, as it is proper
For mortals to do. For neither mortals nor gods have any greater privilege
Than to make everlasting song of the universal law in justice.

Cleanthes, Hymn to Zeus

A very useful collection of historical prayers to the Roman gods.

http://www.novaroma.org/nr/Prayers

All beings proceed from One First Cause.

For either there is no cause of any being, or the causes of all finite things revolve in a circle, or the as­cent (progression) is to infinity, and one thing is the cause of another, and the presubsistence of essence (cause) will in no respect cease. If, however, there is no cause of beings, there will be neither an order of things second and first, of things perfecting and perfec­ted, of things adorning and adorned, of things generat­ing and generated, and of agents and patients, nor will there be any science of beings. For the knowledge of causes is the work of science, and we are then said to know scientifically when we know the causes of things. But if causes revolve in a circle, the same things will be prior and posterior, more powerful and more imbecile. For every thing which produces is better than the nature of that which is produced. Nor does it make a differ­ence to conjoin cause to effect, and through many or fewer media to produce from cause. For cause will be superior to all the intermediate natures of which it is the cause; and the more numerous the media the greater is the causality of the cause.

And if the addition of causes is to infinity, and there is always again a cause prior to another, there will be no science of any being: for there is not a knowledge of any thing infinite. But causes being unknown, neither will there be a science of the things consequent to the causes. If, therefore, it is necessary that there should be a cause of beings, and causes are distinct from the things caused, and there is not an ascent to infinity, there is a First Cause of beings, from which as from a root every thing proceeds,—some things indeed being nearer to but others more remote from it. The neces­sity of the existence of One Principle has been demon­strated, because all multitude is secondary to The One.

Proclus, Elements of Theology, Proposition 11

An index of our dispositions is afforded by the pleasure or pain that accompanies our actions. A man is temperate if he abstains from bodily pleasures and finds this abstinence itself enjoyable, profligate if he feels it irksome; he is brave if he faces danger with pleasure or at all events without pain, cowardly if he does so with pain.

Aristotle, Nicomachean Ethics, II.iii.1

Plato on dialectic as a means of seeing pure Good and Being:

Then isn't this at last, Glaucon, the song that dialectic sings? It is intelligible, but it is imitated by the power of sight. We said that sight tries at last to look at the animals themselves, the stars themselves, and in the end, at the sun itself. In the same way, whenever someone tries through argument and apart from all sense perceptions to find the being itself of each thing and doesn't give up until he grasps the good itself with understanding itself, he reaches the end of the intelligible, just as the other reached the end of the visible. ... Don't you call [this] dialectic? ... No one will dispute it when we say that there is no other inquiry that systematically attempts to grasp with respect to each thing itself what the being of it is, for all the other crafts are concerned with human opinions and desires, with growing or construction, or with the care of growing or constructed things. And as for the rest, I mean geometry and the subjects that follow it, we described them as to some extent grasping what is, for we saw that, while they do dream about what is, they are unable to command a waking view of it as long as they make use of hypotheses that they leave untouched and they cannot give any account of. What mechanism could possibly turn any agreement into knowledge when it begins with something unknown and puts together the conclusion and the steps in between from what is unknown? ... Therefore, dialectic is the only inquiry that travels this road, doing away with hypotheses and proceeding to the first principle itself, so as to be secure. And when the eye of the soul is really buried in a sort of barbaric bog, dialectic gently pulls it out and leads it upwards, using the crafts we described to help it and cooperate with it in turning the soul around. ... Then, do you call someone who is able to give an account of the being of each thing dialectical? But insofar as he's unable to give an account of something, either to himself or to another, do you deny that he has any understanding of it?

Republic, 532a - 534b

There will be a conference of Neoplatonic scholars starting June 10. The conference is accessible via Zoom and costs 60 Euros for nonstudents.

http://www.isns.us/ISNS-2020/index.html

The Pythagoreans had a mid-day break for exercise, Plato was a wrestler, Cleanthes was a boxer, Socrates and Plotinus were soldiers.

These were men.

Don’t fall into the modernist trap of thinking that philosopher = nerdy dweeb.

The command that we should know ourselves means that we should know our souls.

Plato, First Alcibiades, 130e

PYTHAGOREAN MAXIMS (From Hierocles.)

1. Go not beyond the balance. (Transgress not Justice).
2. Sit not down on the bushel. (Do not loaf on your job).
3. Tear not to pieces the crown. (Do not be a joy-killer).
5. Do not poke the fire with a sword. (Do not further inflame the quarrelsome).
6. Having arrived at the frontiers, turn not back. (Do not wish to live over your life).
7. Go not by the public way. (Go not the broad popular way, which leads to destruction).
9. Wear not the image of God on your ring. (Profane not the name of God).
12. Leave no the least mark of the pot on the ashes. (After reconciliation, forget the disagreement).
13. Sow mallows, but never eat them. (Use mildness to others, but not to yourself).
16. Feed not the animals that have crooked claws. (To your family admit no thief or traitor).
26. Put not meat in a foul vessel. (Do not give good precepts to a vicious soul).
31. Do not urinate against the sun. (Be modest).
32. Speak not in the face of the sun. (Make not public the thoughts of your heart).
35. Never sing without harp-accompaniment. (Make of life a whole).
38. Cut not wood on the public road. (Never turn to private use what belongs to the public).
46. Adore the gods, and sacrifice bare-foot. (Pray and sacrifice in humility of heart).
48. Sit down when you worship. (Never worship in a hurry).
58. Plant not the palm-tee. (Do nothing but what is good and useful).
59. Make thy libations to the gods by the ear. (Beautify thy worship by music).
67. Feed not yourself with your left hand. (Support yourself with honest toil, not robbery).
68. It is a horrible crime to wipe off the sweat with iron. (It is a criminal to deprive a man by force of what he earned by labor).
74. Place not the candle against the wall. (Persist not in enlightening the stupid).
75. Write not in the snow. (Trust not your precepts to persons of an inconstant character).

The world is characterized both by flux and by constancy. The material world is the world of flux. But there is an eternal world which “pervades” the material one (i.e., that the material world participates in), and this is the world perceived by the Knowing part of our souls.

This Knowing part of us is the immortal part. We can know that it is immortal by turning inwards and seeing how it contemplates the eternal. It is of like kind.

Reference: Phaedo 79d etc