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2 - ‘Plato and His Scholars’:

Early Cambridge Platonism

from Part I - The Origins of Cambridge Platonism

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  09 May 2024

Samuel M. Kaldas
Affiliation:
The University of Sydney and The University of Notre Dame Australia
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Summary

This chapter considers whether and in what way Whichcote, More, Cudworth and Smith can be called ‘Platonists’. Was Platonism a part of the story they told about themselves, or that their contemporaries told about them, or is it simply an anachronistic label invented by modern scholarship? I argue that ‘Platonism’ was a live intellectual category in the Cambridge Platonists’ seventeenth-century philosophical and theological context and denoted a particular set of doctrinal positions which were associated with ancient Platonism, such as the primacy of God’s goodness over his will. The chapter also investigates evidence of a surge of interest in ancient and Renaissance Platonism at Cambridge in the latter half of the 1630s, centred at Emmanuel College, which included John Sadler, Peter Sterry and Laurence Sarson and also coincides with Henry More’s discovery of Platonism, and Cudworth’s early Platonic letters to John Stoughton. It is argued that these developments provide important context for the origins of Cambridge Platonism, and illuminate the ways in which Whichcote, More, Cudworth and Smith’s intellectual development was shaped by engagement with Platonic texts and ideas.

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The Cambridge Platonists and Early Modern Philosophy
Inventing the Philosophy of Religion
, pp. 30 - 60
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
Print publication year: 2024

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  • ‘Plato and His Scholars’:
  • Samuel M. Kaldas, The University of Sydney and The University of Notre Dame Australia
  • Book: The Cambridge Platonists and Early Modern Philosophy
  • Online publication: 09 May 2024
  • Chapter DOI: https://doi.org/10.1017/9781009426930.004
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  • ‘Plato and His Scholars’:
  • Samuel M. Kaldas, The University of Sydney and The University of Notre Dame Australia
  • Book: The Cambridge Platonists and Early Modern Philosophy
  • Online publication: 09 May 2024
  • Chapter DOI: https://doi.org/10.1017/9781009426930.004
Available formats
×

Save book to Google Drive

To save content items to your account, please confirm that you agree to abide by our usage policies. If this is the first time you use this feature, you will be asked to authorise Cambridge Core to connect with your account. Find out more about saving content to Google Drive.

  • ‘Plato and His Scholars’:
  • Samuel M. Kaldas, The University of Sydney and The University of Notre Dame Australia
  • Book: The Cambridge Platonists and Early Modern Philosophy
  • Online publication: 09 May 2024
  • Chapter DOI: https://doi.org/10.1017/9781009426930.004
Available formats
×