SOURCE: “The Parmenides of Plato and the Origin of the Neoplatonic ‘One’,” in The Classical Quarterly, Vol. XXII, Nos. 3-4, July-October, 1928, pp. 129-42.

In the following essay, Dodds traces Plato's influence on the thought of Plotinus.

expedition to the East with a view to studying the philosophy of Persia and India, but failed to get there; and that on one occasion he accepted the invitation of an Egyptian priest to take part in a spiritualistic seance arranged by the priest at the Iseum in Rome.¹ Add to this the fact that in one passage, dealing with the theory of Beauty,² he expresses his admiration of the Egyptian hieroglyphs; and that (like Plato) he compares philosophy to an initiation into the mysteries—perhaps in his case the Isiac mysteries,³ and perhaps not. Even so might an Englishman, educated and perhaps born in India, take advantage of a punitive expedition...