Mysticos in Plotinus and the Other Late Platonists

In antiquity, we see the term and its relatives develop from referring specifically to the mysteries to referring to esoteric secrets more generally. So that something like the hidden meaning of a myth, for example, can be called a misterion, a mystery, or mysticos. Now here's an important point. Pretty much everyone will agree that the ancient mystery cults were not dealing in mysticism in the modern sense of the term. But almost every general work on mysticism from William James onwards will feature exemplary quotations from Plotinus,. who wrote in the third century CE or the period known as Late Antiquity. In fact, even in the pseudo-dynesius whose books really planted the seeds