PROCLUS DIADOCHUS [PROKLOS, PROCLOS].

Platonici in virtutes morales, ac ciuiles, & partes, facultates que animi Commentarius, nunc primum editus. Raphaele Mambla interprete. Cui Tabellae easdem res ab eodem addite.

      - Roma, ex Officina Balthasaris Cartularii Perusini [Baldassare Cartolari, Cartolaio, Cartullaria], 1542. Small 8vo. Bound in a nice later (19th cent.) marbled boards. Spine with minor wear and a few smaller spots. Four first leaves with a few spots, otherwise very nice and clean. All in all a nice and attractive copy. from the library of Petrus Buoninsegnus, with his book-plate (dated 1814) to inside of front board. (4), 26, (1) ff. The very rare first, and perhaps only, edition of this work, consisting in extracts of Proclos' philosophical works in Latin, namely those on Plato, composed by Raphaël Mambla.Renaissance printings of the philosophical works of the great Greek Neoplatonist Proclos (410-85) (often considered the last great Neoplatonist) are of the utmost scarcity, although his greatest contribution lies in his commentaries on Plato's works, as well as his "Theological Elements". He developed one of the most elaborate, precise and convincing systems of Neoplatonism, and his influence on Medieval, and later also Renaissance, thought was immense. Neoplatonism is a term invented in the 18th century for a school of religious and mystical philosophy, which was founded in the third century and dominated down to the end of Antiquity in the sixth century, when the Emperor Justinian closed the Neoplatonic Academy (529). Neoplatonic teaching revolved around a renewed study of the teachings of Plato that were now combined with the doctrines of other schools of Greek philosophy. The school called itself Platonic, but modern historians named it "Neoplatonic" in order to emphasize its differences from Plato. Plato's dialogues were the main philosophical authority, but Plotinus, Ammnius, Proclus, and the other Noeplatonists attempted to fit all of Plato's scattered doctrines into a coherent system and to incorporate other Stoic and Aristotelian ideas into this, thus creating a comprehensive synthesis of Greek thought. As such Neoplatonism came to dominate the final phase of ancient philosophy and bequeathed its heritage to subsequent ages. Neoplatonism must be considered the only really original product of Greek philosophy in the third century, and after having been neglected during the Middle Ages, this original philosophical direction was being discovered in the Renaissance, the philosophy of which came to be hugely dominated by this Neo-Platonism. "In Proclus, one of the last heads of the Athenian school, Neoplatonism attains its most systematic and even schematic perfection. In his "Elements of Theology" and "Platonic Theology" all things and their mutual relations are neatly defined and deduced in their proper place and order; and the concepts of Aristotle's logic and metaphysics, divested of their specific and concrete reference, are used as elements of a highly abstract and comprehensive ontology. As a commentator, Proclus applied this neat and scholastic system to some of Plato's dialogues, just as other members of the school applied it to Aristotle. And as the leading philosophy of the period, Neoplatonism supplied practically all later Greek Church Fathers and theologians with their philosophical terms and concepts." (Kristeller, Renaissance Thought and its Sources, 1979, p. 53).During the Renaissance a special and profound interest in the teachings of Neoplatonism emerged, and the 15th and 16th century Latin translations and editions of the works of Plato and of the Neoplatonists, which made the texts available to Western readers, are seminal to the history of Platonism, Neoplatonism, and Western thought in general.Not in Adams, not in Graesse, not in Brunet. [Attributes: Hard Cover]