Plato -- Philo -- Plotinus -- Origen -- Nicene orthodoxy: Athanasius ; Gregory of Nyssa -- The monastic contribution: Evagrius of Pontus ; the Macarian Homilies ; Diadochus of Photice -- Augustine -- Denys the Areopagite -- Patristic mysticism and St. John of the Cross ; Divine darkness and the dark night -- The mystical life and the mystical body: Platonism and mysticism ; the communion of saints.