ADDITIONAL NOTES.
Page [9]. Anebo. Porphyry in his Life of Plotinus, and also in the second book of his Treatise on Abstinence from Animals, informs us that he was familiar with a certain Egyptian priest, who, as Gale conjectures, is probably the priest to whom Porphyry now writes. The diction, indeed, as Gale observes, denotes that the person to whom this Epistle is addressed was a very great prophet, who, nevertheless, is afterwards said to be a priest. This, however, is not any thing novel or incongruous. For by Apuleius in Metamorph. lib. xi. the Egyptian Zaclas is said to be propheta primarius et sacerdos, a chief prophet and priest.
Page [9]. Hermes the God who presides over language. The Egyptians celebrated two Hermes, the former of which is here signified by Iamblichus. This deity is the source of invention, and hence he is said to be the son of Maia; because search, which is implied by Maia, leads invention into light. He bestows too mathesis on souls, by unfolding the will of his father Jupiter; and this he accomplishes as the angel or messenger of Jupiter. Proclus in MS. Comment. in Alcibiad. observes, “that this deity is the inspective guardian of gymnastic exercises; and hence hermæ, or carved statues of Mercury, were placed in the Palæstræ; of music, and hence he is honoured as the lyrist λυραιος among the celestial constellations; and of disciplines, because the invention of geometry, reasoning, and discourse is referred to this God. He presides, therefore, over every species of erudition, leading us to an intelligible essence from this mortal abode, governing the different herds of souls, and dispersing the sleep and oblivion with which they are oppressed. He is likewise the supplier of recollection, the end of which is a genuine intellectual apprehension of divine natures.”
P. [10]. The ancient pillars of Hermes. These pillars, according to Amm. Marcellinus, lib. xxii. were concealed prior to the deluge in certain caverns, which were called συριγγες, syringes, not far from the Egyptian Thebes. The second Hermes interpreted these pillars, and his interpretation formed many volumes, as Iamblichus informs us in Section viii. of this work. These pillars are mentioned by Laertius in his Life of Democritus; by Dio Chrysostom in Orat. 49; by Achilles Tatius on Aratus; and by others of the ancients.
P. [15]. There is, therefore, the good itself which is beyond essence, and there is that good which subsists according to essence. There are three orders of good; viz. that which is imparticipable and superessential; that which is imparticipable and essential; and that which is essential and participable. Of these, the last is such as our nature contains; the good which ranks among forms is essential; and that which is beyond essence is superessential. Or we say that the good which subsists in us may be considered as a habit, in consequence of subsisting in a subject; the next to this ranks as essence, and a part of essence, I mean the good which ranks among forms; and the good which is beyond essence, is neither a habit, nor a part. With respect to the good, also, which subsists according to essence, it must be observed, that since forms are twofold, some alone distinguishing the essences of the things fashioned by form, but others their perfections, the genus of essence, same and different, and the form of animal, horse, and man, and every thing of this kind, give distinction to essence and subjects; but the form of the good, the beautiful, and the just, and in like manner the form of virtue, of health, strength, and every thing of a similar nature, are perfective of the beings to which they belong: and of some, essence is the leader, but of others the good. For, as Plato says, every thing except the one, must necessarily participate of essence; and whatever preserves, gives perfection to, or defends any being, must be good. Hence, since these two are leaders, the one of forms which give subsistence to things, and the other of such as are the sources of their perfection; it is necessary that one of these should be subordinate to the other; I mean that the good which is allotted a coordination among forms that are the sources of perfection, should be subordinate to essence, which ranks among causes, whence subsistence originates, if the good is being, and a certain being. For it is either the same with, or different from, essence, which the Elean guest or stranger in the Sophista of Plato shows to be the genus of being. And if the good is the same with essence, an absurdity must ensue: for being and well-being are not the same. But if the good is something different from essence, it must necessarily participate of essence, in consequence of essence being the genus of all forms. But if genera are more ancient than forms, the good which ranks among forms, and is posterior to their genus, will not be the superessential good which reigns over intelligibles; but this must be asserted of that good, under which this and every form is arranged, which possesses being, and which is the leader of the other genera of being.
P. [15]. But the other medium, which is suspended from the Gods, though it is far inferior to them, is that of dæmons. In addition to what is said in this work by Iamblichus concerning dæmons, the following information about them from Olympiodorus, in his MS. Scholia on the Phædo of Plato, is well worthy the attention of the philosophical reader:
“Since there are in the universe things which subsist differently at different times, and since there are also natures which are conjoined with the superessential unities, it is necessary that there should be a certain middle genus, which is neither immediately suspended from deity, nor subsists differently at different times, according to better and worse, but which is always perfect, and does not depart from its proper virtue; and is immutable indeed, but is not conjoined with the superessential [which is the characteristic of deity]. The whole of this genus is dæmoniacal. There are, also, different genera of dæmons: for they are placed under the mundane Gods. The highest of these subsists according to the one of the Gods, and is called an unific and divine genus of dæmons. The next subsists according to the intellect which is suspended from deity, and is called intellectual. The third subsists according to soul, and is called rational. The fourth, according to nature, and is denominated physical. The fifth according to body, which is called corporeal-formed. And the sixth according to matter, and this is denominated material.” Olympiodorus adds, “or after another manner it may be said, that some of these are celestial, others etherial, others aerial, others aquatic, others terrestrial, and others subterranean. With respect to this division also, it is evident that it is derived from the parts of the universe. But irrational dæmons originate from the aerial governors, whence, also, the Chaldean Oracle says,
Ηεριων ελατηρα κυνων χθονιων τε και υγρων.
i. e. being the charioteer of the aerial, terrestrial, and aquatic dogs.” Our guardian dæmons, however, belong to that order of dæmons which is arranged under the Gods that preside over the ascent and descent of souls. For a more copious account of dæmons see the notes on the First Alcibiades in vol. i. of my translation of Plato.
P. [22]. One and the best solution will be obtained by surveying the mode of divine allotment.
The manner in which divine allotments subsist is admirably unfolded by Proclus in Tim. p. [43], as follows: “Since, according to a division of the universe into two parts, we have distributed allotments into the celestial and sublunary, there can be no doubt what the former are, and whether they possess an invariable sameness of subsistence. But the sublunary allotments are deservedly a subject of admiration, whether they are said to be perpetual or not. For since all things in generation are continually changing and flowing, how can the allotments of the providential rulers of them be said to be perpetual? For things in generation are not perpetual. But if their allotments are not perpetual, how is it possible to suppose that divine government can subsist differently at different times? For an allotment is neither a certain separate energy of the Gods, so that sublunary natures changing, we might say that it is exempt, and remains immutable, nor is it that which is governed alone, so that no absurdity would follow from admitting that an allotment is in a flowing condition, and is conversant with all-various mutations; but it is a providential inspection, and unrestrained government of divinity over sublunary concerns. Such being the doubts with which this subject is attended, the following appears to be a solution of the difficulty.
“We must say, then, that it is not proper to consider all the natures that are in generation, and generation itself, as alone consisting of things mutable and flowing, but that there is also something immutable in these, and which is naturally adapted to remain perpetually the same. For the interval which receives and comprehends in itself all the parts of the world, and which has an arrangement through all bodies, is immoveable, lest, being moved, it should require another place, and thus should proceed from one receptacle to another, ad infinitum. The etherial vehicles, also, of divine souls, with which they are circularly invested, and which imitate the lives in the heavens, have a perpetual essence, and are eternally suspended from these divine souls themselves, being full of prolific powers, and performing a circular motion, according to a certain secondary revolution of the celestial orbs. And, in the third place, the wholeness (ολοτης) of the elements has a permanent subsistence, though the parts are all-variously corrupted. For it is necessary that every form in the universe should be never failing, in order that the universe may be perfect, and that, being generated from an immoveable cause, it may be immoveable in its essence. But every wholeness is a form, or rather it is that which it is said to be through the participation of one all perfect form.
“And here we may see the orderly progression of the nature of bodies. For the interval of the universe is immoveable according to every kind of motion. But the vehicles of divine souls alone receive a mutation according to place; for such a motion as this is most remote from essential mutation. And the wholeness of the elements admits in its parts the other motions of bodies, but the whole remains perfectly immutable. The celestial allotments also, which proximately divide the interval of the universe, codistribute likewise the heavens themselves. But those in the sublunary region are primarily, indeed, allotted the parts which are in the interval of the universe, but afterwards they make a distribution according to the definite vehicles of souls. And, in the third place, they remain perpetually the same, according to the total parts of generation. The allotments of the Gods, therefore, do not change, nor do they subsist differently at different times; for they have not their subsistence proximately in that which may be changed.
“How, therefore, do the illuminations of the Gods accede to these? How are the dissolutions of sacred rites effected? And how is the same place at different times under the influence of different spirits? May it not be said, that since the Gods have perpetual allotments, and divide the earth according to divine numbers, similarly to the sections of the heavens, the parts of the earth also are illuminated, so far as they participate of aptitude. But the circulation of the heavenly bodies, through the figures which they possess, produce this aptitude; divine illumination at the same time imparting a power more excellent than the nature which is present with these parts of the earth. This aptitude is also effected by nature herself as a whole, inserting divine impressions in each of the illuminated parts, through which they spontaneously participate of the Gods. For as these parts depend on the Gods, nature inserts in such of them as are different, different images of the divinities. Times too cooperate in producing this aptitude, according to which other things, also, are governed; the proper temperature of the air likewise; and, in short, every thing by which we are surrounded contributes to the increase and diminution of this aptitude. When, therefore, conformably to a concurrence of these many causes, an aptitude to the participation of the Gods is ingenerated in some one of the natures which are disposed to be changed, then a certain divinity is unfolded into light, which, prior to this, was concealed through the inaptitude of the recipients; possessing, indeed, his appropriate allotment eternally, and always extending the participation of himself, similarly to illuminations from the sun, but not being always participated by sublunary natures, in consequence of their inaptitude to such participation. For as with respect to partial souls such as ours, which at different times embrace different lives, some of them, indeed, choose lives accommodated to their appropriate Gods, but others foreign lives, through oblivion of the divinities to whom they belong; thus, also, with respect to sacred places, some are adapted to the power which there receives its allotment, but others are suspended from a different order. And on this account, as the Athenian guest in Plato says, some places are more fortunate, but others more unfortunate.
“The divine Iamblichus, however, doubts how the Gods are said to be allotted certain places according to definite times, as, by Plato in the Timæus, Minerva is said to have been first allotted the guardianship of Athens, and afterwards of Saïs. For if their allotment commenced from a certain time, it will also at a certain time cease. For every thing which is measured by time is of this kind. And farther still, was the place which at a certain time they are allotted, without a presiding deity prior to this allotment, or was it under the government of other Gods? For if it was without a presiding deity, how is it to be admitted that a certain part of the universe was once entirely destitute of divinity? How can any place remain without the guardianship of superior beings? And if any place is sufficient to the preservation of itself, how does it afterwards become the allotment of some one of the Gods? But if it should be said, that it is afterwards under the government of another God, of whom it becomes the allotment, this also is absurd. For the second God does not divulse the government and allotment of the former, nor do the Gods alternately occupy the places of each other, nor dæmons change their allotments. Such being the doubts on this subject, he solves them by saying, that the allotments of the Gods remain perpetually unchanged, but that the participants of them at one time, indeed, enjoy the beneficent influence of the presiding powers, but at another are deprived of it. He adds, that these are the mutations measured by time, which sacred institutes frequently call the birthday of the Gods.
P. [23]. Which also the art of divine works perceiving, &c. This art of divine works is called theurgy, in which Pythagoras was initiated among the Syrians, as we are informed by Iamblichus in his Life of that philosopher. (See p. [9] of my translation of that work.) Proclus also was skilled in this art, as may be seen in the Life of him by Marinus. Psellus, in his MS. treatise on Dæmons, says, as we have before observed, “that magic formed the last part of the sacerdotal science”; in which place by magic he doubtless means that kind of it which is denominated theurgy. And that theurgy was employed by the ancients in their mysteries, I have fully proved in my treatise on the Eleusinian and Bacchic Mysteries.[[152]] This theurgy, too, is doubtless the same as the magic of Zoroaster, which Plato in the First Alcibiades says, consisted in the worship of the Gods; on which passage the following account of theurgy by Proclus was, I have no doubt, originally part of a commentary. For the MS. Commentary of Proclus, which is extant on this dialogue, does not extend to more than a third part of it; and this Dissertation on Theurgy, which is only extant in Latin, was published by Ficinus the translator, immediately after his Excerpta, from this Commentary. So that it seems highly probable that the manuscript from which Ficinus translated his Excerpta, was much more perfect than that which has been preserved to us, in consequence of containing this account of the theurgy of the ancients.
“In the same manner as lovers gradually advance from that beauty which is apparent in sensible forms, to that which is divine; so the ancient priests, when they considered that there is a certain alliance and sympathy in natural things to each other, and of things manifest to occult powers; and discovered that all things subsist in all, they fabricated a sacred science from this mutual sympathy and similarity. Thus they recognised things supreme in such as are subordinate, and the subordinate in the supreme: in the celestial regions, terrene properties subsisting in a causal and celestial manner; and in earth celestial properties, but according to a terrene condition. For how shall we account for those plants called heliotropes, that is, attendants on the sun, moving in correspondence with the revolution of its orb, but selenitropes, or attendants on the moon, turning in exact conformity to her motion? It is because all things pray, and hymn the leaders of their respective orders; but some intellectually, and others rationally; some in a natural, and others after a sensible, manner. Hence the sunflower, as far as it is able, moves in a circular dance towards the sun; so that if any one could hear the pulsation made by its circuit in the air, he would perceive something composed by a sound of this kind, in honour of its king, such as a plant is capable of framing. Hence, too, we may behold the sun and moon in the earth, but according to a terrene quality; but in the celestial regions, all plants, and stones, and animals, possessing an intellectual life according to a celestial nature. Now the ancients, having contemplated this mutual sympathy of things, applied for occult purposes, both celestial and terrene natures, by means of which, through a certain similitude, they deduced divine virtues into this inferior abode. For, indeed, similitude itself is a sufficient cause of binding things together in union and consent. Thus, if a piece of paper is heated, and afterwards placed near a lamp, though it does not touch the fire, the paper will be suddenly inflamed, and the flame will descend from the superior to the inferior parts. This heated paper we may compare to a certain relation of inferiors to superiors; and its approximation to the lamp, to the opportune use of things according to time, place, and matter. But the procession of fire into the paper, aptly represents the presence of divine light to that nature which is capable of its reception. Lastly, the inflammation of the paper may be compared to the deification of mortals, and to the illumination of material natures, which are afterwards carried upwards, like the enkindled paper, from a certain participation of divine seed.
“Again, the lotus, before the rising of the sun, folds its leaves into itself, but gradually expands them on its rising: unfolding them in proportion to the sun’s ascent to the zenith; but as gradually contracting them as that luminary descends to the west. Hence this plant, by the expansion and contraction of its leaves, appears no less to honour the sun, than men by the gesture of their eyelids, and the motion of their lips. But this imitation and certain participation of supernal light is not only visible in plants, which possess nothing more than a vestige of life, but likewise in particular stones. Thus the sun-stone, by its golden rays, imitates those of the sun; but the stone called the eye of heaven, or of the sun, has a figure similar to the pupil of an eye, and a ray shines from the middle of the pupil. Thus, too, the lunar stone, which has a figure similar to the moon when horned, by a certain change of itself, follows the lunar motion. Lastly, the stone called helioselenus, i. e. of the sun and moon, imitates, after a manner, the congress of those luminaries, which it images by its colour. So that all things are full of divine natures; terrestrial natures receiving the plenitude of such as are celestial, but celestial of supercelestial essences;[[153]] while every order of things proceeds gradually, in a beautiful descent, from the highest to the lowest. For whatever particulars are collected into one above the order of things, are afterwards dilated in descending, various souls being distributed under their various ruling divinities.
“In the next place, there are many solar animals, such as lions and cocks, which participate, according to their nature, of a certain solar divinity; whence it is wonderful how much inferiors yield to superiors in the same order, though they do not yield in magnitude and power. Hence it is said, that a cock is very much feared, and, as it were, reverenced, by a lion; the reason of which we cannot assign from matter or sense, but from the contemplation alone of a supernal order. For thus we shall find that the presence of the solar virtue accords more with a cock than with a lion. This will be evident from considering that the cock, as it were, with certain hymns, applauds and calls to the rising sun, when he bends his course to us from the antipodes; and that solar angels sometimes appear in forms of this kind, who, though they are without shape, yet present themselves to us, who are connected with shape, in some sensible form. Sometimes, too, there are dæmons with a leonine front, who when a cock is placed before them, unless they are of a solar order, suddenly disappear; and this because those natures which have an inferior rank in the same order always reverence their superiors; just as many, on beholding the images of divine men, are accustomed, from the very view, to be fearful of perpetrating any thing base.
“In fine, some things turn round correspondent to the revolutions of the sun, as the plants which we have mentioned, and others after a manner imitate the solar rays, as the palm and the date; some the fiery nature of the sun, as the laurel; and others a different property. For, indeed, we may perceive that the properties which are collected in the sun, are every where distributed to subsequent natures constituted in a solar order, that is, to angels, dæmons, souls, animals, plants, and stones. Hence the authors of the ancient priesthood discovered from things apparent the worship of superior powers, while they mingled some things and purified others. They mingled many things indeed together, because they saw that some simple substances possessed a divine property (though not taken singly) sufficient to call down that particular power, of which they were participants. Hence, by the mingling of many things together, they attracted upon us a supernal influx; and by the composition of one thing from many, they produced an assimilation to that one which is above many; and composed statues from the mixture of various substances conspiring in sympathy and consent. Besides this, they collected composite odours, by a divine art, into one, comprehending a multitude of powers, and symbolizing with the unity of a divine essence; considering that division debilitates each of these, but that mingling them together restores them to the idea of their exemplar.
“But sometimes one herb, or one stone, is sufficient to a divine operation. Thus a thistle is sufficient to procure the sudden appearance of some superior power; but a laurel, raccinum (or a thorny kind of sprig), the land and sea onion, the coral, the diamond, and the jasper, operate as a safeguard. The heart of a mole is subservient to divination, but sulphur and marine water to purification. Hence the ancient priests, by the mutual relation and sympathy of things to each other, collected their virtues into one, but expelled them by repugnancy and antipathy; purifying when it was requisite with sulphur and bitumen, and sprinkling with marine water. For sulphur purifies, from the sharpness of its odour; but marine water on account of its fiery portion. Besides this, in the worship of the Gods, they offered animals, and other substances congruous to their nature; and received, in the first place, the powers of dæmons, as proximate to natural substances and operations; and by these natural substances they convoked into their presence those powers to which they approached. Afterwards they proceeded from dæmons to the powers and energies of the Gods; partly, indeed, from dæmoniacal instruction, but partly by their own industry, interpreting appropriate symbols, and ascending to a proper intelligence of the Gods. And lastly, laying aside natural substances and their operations, they received themselves into the communion and fellowship of the Gods.”
The Emperor Julian alludes to this theurgical art, in the following extract from his Arguments against the Christians, preserved by Cyril. Το γαρ εκ θεων εις ανθρωπους αφικνουμενον πνευμα, σπανιακις μεν και εν ολιγοις γινεται, και ουτε παντα ανδρα τουτου μετασχειν ρᾳδιον, ουτε εν παντι καιρῳ. ταυτῃ το και το παρ’ Εβραιοις επελιπεν, ουκουν ουδε παρ’ Αιγυπτιοις εις τουτο σωζεται. Φαινεται δε και τα αυτοφυη χρηστηρια ταις των χρονων εικοντα περιοδοις. ὃ δε φιλανθρωπος ημων δεσποτης και πατηρ Ζευς εννοησας, ως αν μη πανταπασι της προς τους θεους αποστερηθωμεν κοινωνιας δεδωκεν ημιν δια των ιερων τεχνων επισκεψιν, υφ’ ης προς τας χρειας εξομεν την αποχρωσαν βοηθειαν. i. e. “For the inspiration which arrives to men from the Gods is rare, and exists but in a few. Nor is it easy for every man to partake of this, nor at every time. This has ceased among the Hebrews, nor is it preserved to the present time among the Egyptians. Spontaneous oracles, also, are seen to yield to temporal periods. This, however, our philanthropic lord and father Jupiter understanding, that we might not be entirely deprived of communion with the Gods, has given us observation through sacred arts, by which we have at hand sufficient assistance.” For the cause why, at stated times, sacred arts, oracles, and inspiration fail, see the additional notes to my translation of Iamblichus’s Life of Pythagoras.
P. [24]. The participant of the rational soul becomes the cause of suffering to the composite. See my translation of Plotinus on the Impassivity of Incorporeal Natures, in which this is beautifully and profoundly demonstrated. Proclus, also, in Tim. lib. v. p. [340], admirably observes, that the motion of the nutritive power, and the percussions of sense, are the causes of the perturbation of the soul; but that we must not fancy that the soul suffers any thing through these. “For as if,” says he, “some one standing on the margin of a river should behold the image and form of himself in the floating stream, he indeed will preserve his face unchanged; but the stream, being all-variously moved, will change the image, so that at different times it will appear to him different, oblique and erect, and perhaps divulsed and continuous. Let us suppose too, that such a one, through being unaccustomed to the spectacle, should think that it was himself that suffered this distortion, in consequence of surveying his shadow in the water, and thus thinking, should be afflicted and disturbed, astonished and impeded. After the same manner, the soul beholding the image of herself in body, borne along in the river of generation, and variously disposed at different times, through inward passions and external impulses, is indeed herself impassive, but thinks that she suffers; and being ignorant of, and mistaking her image for, herself, is disturbed, astonished, and perplexed.”
P. [35]. Since, however, the order of all the Gods is profoundly united.——For the very existence in them, whatever it may be, is the one of their nature.
The Gods are self-perfect superessential unities, so far as they are Gods. For the principal subsistence of every thing is according to the summit of its essence, and this in the Gods is the one, through which they are profoundly united to each other and to the one itself, or the ineffable principle of things, from which they are ineffably unfolded into light. Concerning this union of them with each other, Proclus admirably observes as follows, in his MS. Commentary on the Parmenides of Plato. “All these unities are in, and are profoundly united to, each other, and their union is far greater than the communion and sameness which subsist in beings. For in the latter there is indeed mutual mixture of forms, similitude, and friendship, and a participation of each other; but the union of the Gods, as being a union of unities, is much more uniform, ineffable, and transcendent: for here all are in all, which does not take place in forms or ideas;[[154]] and their unmingled purity, and the characteristic of each, in a manner far surpassing the diversity in ideas, preserves their natures unconfused, and distinguishes their peculiar powers. Hence, some of them are more universal, and others more particular; some of them are characterised by permanency, others by progression, and others by conversion, or regression. Some, again, are generative, others anagogic, or of an elevating nature, and others demiurgic; and universally, there are different characteristics of different Gods, viz. the connective, perfective, demiurgic, assimilative, and such others as are celebrated posterior to these; so that all are in all, and yet each is at the same time separate and distinct.
“Indeed we obtain this knowledge of their union and characteristics from the natures by which they are participated. For, with respect to the visible Gods, we say that there is one soul of the sun, and another of the earth, directing our attention to the visible bodies of these divinities, which possess much variety in their essence, powers, and dignity among wholes. As, therefore, we apprehend the difference of incorporeal essences from sensible inspection, in like manner from the variety of incorporeal essences, we are enabled to know something of the unmingled distinction of the first and superessential unities, and of the characteristics of each. For each unity has a multitude suspended from its nature, which is either intelligible alone; or intelligible, and at the same time intellectual; or intellectual alone; and this last is either participated, or not participated; and this again, is either supermundane, or mundane. And thus far does the progression of the unities extend.” Shortly after he adds, “As trees by their extremities are rooted in the earth, and through this are earthly in every part, in the same manner divine natures are rooted by their summits in the one, and each is a unity and one, through its unconfused union with the one itself.” See more on this most important of all subjects in the notes to my translation of the Parmenides.
P. [50]. For as in all other things, such as are principal, primarily begin from themselves, &c.
Hence every God begins his own energy from himself, which Proclus thus demonstrates in Prop. 131 of his Elements of Theology. “For every God first exhibits the peculiarity of his presence with secondary natures in himself; because he imparts himself to other things also according to his own exuberant plenitude. For neither is deficiency adapted to the Gods, nor fulness alone. For every thing deficient is imperfect, and not being itself perfect, it is impossible it should make another thing to be perfect. But that which is full is alone sufficient to itself, and is not yet prepared to communicate. It is necessary, therefore, that the nature which fills other things, and which extends to other things the communications of itself, should be superplenary, or exuberantly full. Hence, if a divine nature fills all things from itself with the good which it contains in itself, it is exuberantly full. And if this be the case, establishing first in itself the peculiarity which it imparts to others, it will extend to them the communications of superplenary goodness.
P. [59]. It is requisite also to know what enthusiasm is, and how it is produced.
The following account of enthusiasm, and of the different kinds of mania mentioned by Plato in the Phædrus, from the Scholia of Hermeas on that dialogue, is extracted from the additional notes to my translation of Proclus on the Timæus, and is given in this place for the sake of the Platonic English reader, who may not have that translation in his possession, as a valuable addition to what is here said by Iamblichus on this subject.
“Since Plato here delivers four kinds of mania, by which I mean enthusiasm, and possession or inspiration from the Gods, viz. the musical, the telestic, the prophetic, and the amatory, previous to the discussion of each, we must first speak about enthusiasm, and show to what part of the soul the enthusiastic energy pertains; whether each part of it possesses this energy; if all enthusiasm is from the Gods; and in what part of the soul it is ingenerated; or whether it subsists in something else more excellent than soul. Where, then, does that which is properly and primarily called enthusiasm subsist, and what is it? Of the rational soul there are two parts, one of which is dianoia, but the other opinion. Again, however, of dianoia, one part is said to be the lowest, and is properly dianoia, but another part of it is the highest, which is said to be the intellect of it, according to which the soul especially becomes intellectual, and which some call intellect in capacity. There is also another thing above this, which is the summit of the whole soul, and most allied to the one, which likewise wishes well to all things, and always gives itself up to the Gods, and is readily disposed to do whatever they please. This, too, is said to be the one of the soul, bears the image of the superessential one, and unites the whole soul. But that these things necessarily thus subsist, we may learn as follows: The rational soul derives its existence from all the causes prior to itself, i. e. from intellect and the Gods. But it subsists also from itself: for it perfects itself. So far, therefore, as it subsists from the Gods, it possesses the one, which unites all its powers, and all the multitude of itself, and conjoins them to the one itself, and is the first recipient of the goods imparted by the Gods. It likewise makes all the essence of the soul to be boniform, according to which it is connected with the Gods, and united to them. But so far as it subsists from intellect it possesses an intellectual nature, according to which it apprehends forms, by simple projections, or intuitions, and not discursively; and is conjoined to the intellect which is above itself. And so far as it constitutes itself, it possesses the dianoetic power, according to which it generates sciences and certain theorems, energizes discursively, and collects conclusions from propositions. For that it constitutes or gives subsistence to itself, is evident from its imparting perfection to itself; since that which leads itself to perfection, and imparts to itself well-being, will much more impart to itself existence. For well-being is a greater thing than being. If, therefore, the soul imparts that which is greater to itself, it will much more impart that which is less. Hence that which is primarily, properly, and truly enthusiasm from the Gods, is effected according to this one of the soul, which is above dianoia, and above the intellect of the soul; which one is at another time in a relaxed and dormant state. This one, likewise, becoming illuminated [by the Gods], all the life of the soul is illuminated, and also intellect, dianoia, and the irrational part, and the resemblance of enthusiasm is transmitted as far as to the body itself.
“Other enthusiasms, therefore, are produced about other parts of the soul,[[155]] certain dæmons exciting them,[[156]] or the Gods also, though not without the intervention of dæmons. For dianoia is said to energize enthusiastically, when it discovers sciences and theorems in a very short space of time, and in a greater degree than other men. Opinion, likewise, and the phantasy, are said thus to energize when they discover arts, and accomplish admirable works, such, for instance, as Phidias effected in the formation of statues, and another in another art, as also Homer says[[157]] of him who made the belt of Hercules, ‘that he neither did nor would artificially produce such another.’ Anger, likewise, is said to energize enthusiastically, when in battle it energizes supernaturally.
Like Mars, when brandishing his spear, he raged.[[158]]
But if some one, yielding to desire, should eat of that which reason forbids, and through this should unexpectedly become well, you may say that desire also, in this instance, energized enthusiastically, though obscurely; so that enthusiasm is likewise produced about the other parts of the soul. Enthusiasm, however, properly so called, is when this one of the soul, which is above intellect, is excited to the Gods, and is from thence inspired. But at different times it is possessed about the aptitudes of itself, by different Gods; and is more or less possessed when intellect or dianoia is that which is moved. As, therefore, when we inquire what philosophy is, we do not always accurately define it, but frequently, from an improper use of the word, call mathematics or physics philosophy and science; we do the like also with respect to enthusiasm. For though it should be the phantasy which is excited, we are accustomed to call the excitation enthusiasm. Moreover, those who ascribe enthusiasm to the temperatures of bodies, or the excellent temperament of the air, or the ascendency of exhalations, or the aptitudes of times and places, or the agency of the bodies that revolve in the heavens, speak rather of the cooperating and material causes of the thing than of the causes of it properly so called. You have, therefore, for the producing cause of enthusiasm, the Gods; for the material cause, the enthusiastically energizing soul itself, or the external symbols; for the formal cause, the inspiration of the Gods about the one of the soul; and for the final cause, good.
“If, however, the Gods always wish the soul what is good, why does not the soul always energize enthusiastically? May we not say, that the Gods indeed always wish the soul what is good, but they are also willing that the order of the universe should prevail, and that the soul, through many causes, is not always adapted to enthusiasm, on which account it does not always enthusiastically energize? But some say that the telestic art extends as far as to the sublunary region. If, therefore, they mean that no one of the superlunary and celestial natures energizes in the sublunary region, they evidently assert what is absurd. But if they mean that the Telestæ, or mystic operators, are not able to energize above the lunar sphere, we say, that if all the allotments of souls are sublunary, their assertion will be true; but if there are also allotments of souls above the moon, as there are (for some are the attendants of the sun, others of the moon, and others of Saturn, since the Demiurgus disseminated some of them into the earth, others into the moon, and others elsewhere), this being the case, it will be possible for the soul to energize above the moon. For what the whole order of things impacts to the soul for a very extended period of time, this the soul is also able to impart to itself for a short space of time, when assisted by the Gods through the telestic art. For the soul can never energize above its own allotment, but can energize to the extent of it. Thus, for instance, if the allotment of the soul was as far as to philosophy, the soul would be able, though it should not choose a philosophic but some other life, to energize in that life somewhat philosophically. There are also said to be certain supermundane souls. And thus we have shown how the soul energizes enthusiastically.
But how are statues said to have an enthusiastic energy? May we not say, that a statue being inanimate, does not itself energize about divinity, but the telestic art, purifying the matter of which the statue consists, and placing round it certain characters and symbols, in the first place renders it, through these means, animated, and causes it to receive a certain life from the world; and, in the next place, after this, it prepares the statue to be illuminated by a divine nature, through which it always delivers oracles, as long as it is properly adapted. For the statue, when it has been rendered perfect by the telestic art, remains afterwards [endued with a prophetic power] till it becomes entirely unadapted to divine illumination; but he who receives the inspiring influence of the Gods receives it only at certain times, and not always. But the cause of this is, that the soul, when filled with deity, energizes about it. Hence, in consequence of energizing above its own power, it becomes weary. For it would be a God, and similar to the souls of the stars, if it did not become weary. But the statue, conformably to its participations, remains illuminated. Hence the inaptitude of it entirely proceeds into privation, unless it is again, de novo, perfected and animated by the mystic operator. We have sufficiently shown, therefore, that enthusiasm, properly so called, is effected about the one of the soul, and that it is an illumination of divinity.
“In the next place, let us discuss the order and the use of the four manias, and show why the philosopher makes mention of these alone. Is it because there are no other than these, or because these were sufficient for his purpose? That there are, therefore, many other divine inspirations and manias Plato himself indicates as he proceeds, and prior to this, he makes mention of the inspiration from the Nymphs. But there are also inspirations from Pan, from the mother of the Gods, and from the Corybantes, which are elsewhere mentioned by Plato. Here, however, he alone delivers these four manias; in the first place, because these alone are sufficient to the soul, in the attainment of its proper apocatastasis, as we shall afterwards show; and in the next place, because he delivers the proximate steps of ascent to the soul. For the gifts of the Gods to all beings are many and incomprehensible. But now he delivers to us the energies of the Gods which are extended to souls. He delivers, however, these four manias, not as if one of them was not sufficient, and especially the amatory, to lead back the soul to its pristine felicity; but at present the series and regular gradation of them, and the orderly perfection of the soul, are unfolded. As, therefore, it is possible for the tyrannic life, when suddenly changed, to become aristocratic, through employing strenuous promptitude and a divine allotment, but the gradual ascent is from a tyrannic to a democratic, and from this to an oligarchic life, afterwards to a timocratic, and at last to an aristocratic life, but the descent and lapse are vice versa; thus also here, the soul being about to ascend, and be restored to its former felicity, is in the first place possessed with the musical mania, afterwards with the telestic, then with the prophetic, and, in the last place, with the amatory mania. These inspirations, however; conspire with, and are in want of, each other; so abundant is their communion. For the telestic requires the prophetic[[159]] mania; since the latter[[160]] interprets many things pertaining to the former. And again, the prophetic requires the telestic mania. For the telestic mania perfects and establishes oracular predictions. Farther still, the prophetic uses the poetic and musical mania. For prophets, as I may say, always speak in verse. And again, the musical uses the prophetic mania spontaneously, as Plato says. But what occasion is there to speak about the amatory and musical manias? For nearly the same persons exercise both these, as, for instance, Sappho, Anacreon, and the like, in consequence of these not being able to subsist without each other. But it is very evident that the amatory mania contributes to all these, since it is subservient to enthusiasm of every kind: for no enthusiasm can be effected without amatory inspiration. And you may see how Orpheus appears to have applied himself to all these, as being in want of, and adhering to, each other. For we learn that he was most telestic, and most prophetic, and was excited by Apollo; and besides this, that he was most poetic, on which account he is said to have been the son of Calliope. He was likewise most amatory, as he himself acknowledges to Musæus, extending to him divine goods, and rendering him perfect. Hence he appears to have been possessed with all the manias, and this by a necessary consequence. For there is an abundant union, conspiration, and alliance with each other, of the Gods who preside over these manias, viz. of the Muses, Bacchus, Apollo, and Love.
“It remains, therefore, that we should unfold the nature of each of the manias, previously observing that those which are internal, and originate from the soul itself, and give perfection to it, are of one kind; but the external energies of them, and which preserve the outward man, and our nature, are of another. The four external, however, are analogous to the four internal manias. Let us consider, therefore, in the first place, the internal, and which alone originate from the soul itself, and let us see what they effect in the soul. In order, likewise, that this may become manifest, and also their arrangement, let us survey from on high, the descent, as Plato says, and defluxion of the wings of the soul. From the beginning, therefore, and at first, the soul was united to the Gods, and its unity to their one. But afterwards the soul departing from this divine union descended into intellect, and no longer possessed real beings unitedly, and in one, but apprehended and surveyed them by simple projections, and, as it were, contacts of its intellect. In the next place, departing from intellect, and descending into reasoning and dianoia, it no longer apprehended real beings by simple intuitions, but syllogistically and transitively, proceeding from one thing to another, from propositions to conclusions. Afterwards, abandoning true reasoning, and the dissolving peculiarity, it descended into generation, and became filled with much irrationality and perturbation. It is necessary, therefore, that it should recur to its proper principles and again return to the place from whence it came. To this ascent and apocatastasis, however, these four manias contribute. And the musical mania, indeed, leads to symphony and harmony, the agitated and disturbed nature of the parts of the soul, which were hurried away to indefiniteness and inaptitude, and were filled with abundant tumult. But the telestic mania causes the soul to be perfect and entire, and prepares it to energize intellectually. For the musical mania alone harmonizes and represses the parts of the soul; but the telestic causes the whole of it to energize, and prepares it to become entire, so that the intellectual part of it may energize. For the soul, by descending into the realms of generation, resembles a thing broken and relaxed. And the circle of the same, or the intellectual part of it, is fettered; but the circle of the different, or the doxastic part, sustains many fractures and turnings. Hence, the soul energizes partially, and not according to the whole of itself. The Dionysiacal inspiration, therefore, after the parts of the soul are coharmonized, renders it perfect, and causes it to energize according to the whole of itself, and to live intellectually. But the Apolloniacal mania converts and coexcites all the multiplied powers, and the whole of the soul, to the one of it. Hence Apollo is denominated as elevating the soul from multitude to the one. And the remaining mania, the amatory, receiving the soul united, conjoins this one of the soul to the Gods, and to intelligible beauty. As the givers, therefore, of these manias are transcendently united, and are in each other, the gifts also on this account participate of, and communicate with, each other, and the recipient, which is the soul, possesses an adaptation to all the gifts. This, therefore, is the order, and these are the energies and powers within the soul itself, of these four manias.
“But let us also consider their external energies on man, and what they outwardly effect about us. The musical mania, therefore, causes us to speak in verse, and to act and be moved rythmically, and to sing in metre, the splendid deeds of divine men, and their virtues and pursuits; and, through these, to discipline our life, in the same manner as the inward manias coharmonize our soul. But the telestic mania, expelling every thing foreign, contaminating, and noxious, preserves our life perfect and innoxious, and banishing an insane and diabolical phantasy, causes us to be sane, entire, and perfect, just as the internal telestic mania makes the soul to be perfect and entire. Again, the prophetic mania contracts into one the extension and infinity of time, and sees, as in one present now, all things, the past, the future, and the existing time. Hence it predicts what will be, which it sees as present to itself. It causes us, therefore, to pass through life in an irreprehensible manner; just as the internal prophetic mania contracts and elevates all the multiplied and many powers and lives of the soul to the one, in order that it may in a greater degree be preserved and connected. But the amatory mania converts young persons to us, and causes them to become our friends, being instructive of youth, and leading them from sensible beauty to our psychical beauty, and from this sending them to intelligible beauty; in the same manner as the internal amatory mania conjoins the one of the soul to the Gods.
“All the above mentioned manias, therefore, are superior to the prudent and temperate energies of the soul. Nevertheless, there is a mania which is coordinate with temperance, and which we say has in a certain respect a prerogative above[[161]] it. For certain inspirations are produced, according to the middle and also according to the doxastic reasons of the soul, conformably to which artists effect certain things, and discover theorems beyond expectation, as Asclepius, for instance, in medicine, and Hercules in the practic[[162]] life.”
Afterwards, in commenting on what Plato says of the mania from the Muses, viz. “that it adorns the infinite deeds of the ancients,” Hermeas observes, “that the inward energy in the soul of the poetic mania, by applying itself to superior and intelligible natures, imparts to subordinate natures harmony and order; but that the external divinely-inspired poetry celebrates the deeds of the ancients, and instructs both its contemporaries and posterity, extending its energies every where.” But Plato says, “that he who without the divinely-inspired mania of the Muses expects to become a divine poet, will, by thus fancying, become himself imperfect, and his poetry will be vanquished and concealed by the poetry which is the progeny of mania.” Hermeas adds, “For what similitude is there between the poetry of Chærilus and Callimachus, and that of Homer and Pindar? For the divinely-inspired poets, as being filled from the Muses, always invoke them, and extend to them all that they say.” For a fuller and most admirable account of the poetic mania, and of the different species of poetry by Proclus, see the notes on the tenth book of the Republic, in my translation of Plato, and also the Introduction to my translation of the Rhetoric, Poetic, and Nicomachean Ethics of Aristotle.
From what is here said by Hermeas about enthusiasm, the intelligent reader will easily see that none of the Roman poets, whose works have been transmitted to us, possessed that which is primarily, properly, and truly enthusiasm, or that highest species of it in which the one of the soul is illuminated by a divine nature, and through transcendent similitude is united to it. As to Virgil, indeed, the prince of these poets, though he invokes the Muse in the beginning of the Æneid, yet his invocation of her is but a partial and secondary thing. For he only calls on her to unfold to him the causes that involved a man of such remarkable piety as Æneas in so many misfortunes:
Musa, mihi causa memora, &c.
And, confiding in his own genius, he begins his poem without soliciting supernal inspiration,
Arma, virumque cano, &c.
To which may be added, that this placing himself before the Muse, resembles the ego et meus rex of Wolsey. On the contrary, divinely-inspired poets, as Hermeas well observes, knock, as it were, at the gates of the Muses, and thus being filled from thence exclaim,
Εσπετε νυν μοι Μουσαι
And,
Μηνιν αειδε θεα—
And,
Ανδρα μοι εννεπε Μουσα.
For being always extended to them, they dispose the whole of what they afterwards say as derived from their inspiring influence. With an arrogance too, peculiar to the Romans, who, as a certain Greek poet[[163]] says, were a people
Beyond measure proud.
He associates himself, in his fourth Eclogue, with the Muses, as their equal:
Sicelides Musæ, paulo majora canamus.
Which reminds me of what Suetonius relates of Caligula, that he would place himself between the statues of Castor and Pollux, and confer privately with Jupiter Capitolinus, fancying that he was intimate with, and of equal dignity with, these divinities. And as to the poets that have lived since the fall of the Roman empire, it would be ridiculous to suppose that they possessed this highest enthusiasm, as they did not believe in the existence of the sources from whence it is alone genuinely derived.
P. [67]. The attentive power of the soul. This is that part or power of the rational soul which primarily apprehends the operations of the senses. For the rational soul not only has intellect in capacity, the dianoetic power, will, and choice, but another power, which is called by the best of the Greek interpreters of Aristotle, as well as by Iamblichus, το προσεκτικον, the attentive. This power investigates and perceives whatever is transacted in man; and says, I understand, I think, I opine, I am angry, I desire. And, in short, this attentive part of the rational soul passes through all the rational, irrational, vegetable, or physical powers. If, therefore, it is requisite it should pass through all these powers, it will also proceed through the senses, and say, I see, I hear; for it is the peculiarity of that which apprehends energies thus to speak. Hence if it is the attentive power which says these things, it is this power which apprehends the energy of sensibles; for it is necessary that the nature which apprehends all things should be one, since man also is one. For if one part of it should apprehend these, and another those things, it is just, as Aristotle says, as if you should perceive this thing, and I that. It is necessary, therefore, that the attentive power should be one indivisible thing.
P. [74]. For the human soul is on all sides darkened by body, which he who denominates the river of Negligence, or the water of Oblivion, &c.——will not by such appellations sufficiently express its turpitude. “The whole of generation, as well as the human body,” says Proclus in Tim. lib. v. p. [339], “may be called a river, through its rapid, impetuous, and unstable flux. Thus also in the Republic, Plato calls the whole genesiurgic nature the river of Lethe; in which are contained, as Empedocles says, Oblivion, and the meadow of Ate; the voracity of matter, and the light-hating world, as the Gods say; and the winding streams under which many are drawn down, as the Chaldean oracles assert.”
P. [105]. But there are a certain few who by employing a certain supernatural power of intellect, are removed from nature, &c. The class to which these few belong is beautifully unfolded, as follows, by Plotinus, in the beginning of his Treatise on Intellect, Ideas, and real Being. “Since all men from their birth employ sense prior to intellect, and are necessarily first conversant with sensibles, some proceeding no farther, pass through life, considering these as the first and last of things, and apprehending that whatever is painful among these is evil, and whatever is pleasant is good; thus thinking it sufficient to pursue the one and avoid the other. Those, too, among them who pretend to a greater share of reason than others, esteem this to be wisdom, being affected in a manner similar to more heavy birds, who collecting many things from the earth, and being oppressed with the weight, are unable to fly on high, though they have received wings for this purpose from nature. But others are in a small degree elevated from things subordinate, the more excellent part of the soul recalling them from pleasure to a more worthy pursuit. As they are, however, unable to look on high, and as not possessing any thing else which can afford them rest, they betake themselves, together with the name of virtue, to actions and the election of things inferior, from which they at first endeavoured to raise themselves, though in vain. In the third class is the race of divine men, who, through a more excellent power, and with piercing eyes, acutely perceive supernal light, to the vision of which they raise themselves above the clouds and darkness, as it were, of this lower world, and there abiding despise every thing in these regions of sense; being no otherwise delighted with the place which is truly and properly their own, than he who after many wanderings is at length restored to his lawful country.” See my translation of the whole of this treatise.
P. [117]. By mire, therefore, understand every thing corporeal-formed and material. “Matter,” says Simplicius in his Commentary on the first book of Aristotle’s Physics, “is nothing else than the mutation of sensibles, with respect to intelligibles, deviating from thence, and carried downwards to nonbeing. Those things, indeed, which are the properties of sensibles are irrational, corporeal, distributed into parts, and passing into bulk and divulsion, through an ultimate progression into generation, viz. into matter; for matter is always truly the last sediment. Hence, also, the Egyptians call the dregs of the first life, which they symbolically denominate water, matter, being as it were a certain mire. And matter is, as it were, the receptacle of generated and sensible natures, not subsisting as any definite form, but as the state or condition of subsistence; just as the impartible, the immaterial, true being, and things of this kind, are the constitution of an intelligible nature; all forms, indeed, subsisting both in sensibles and intelligibles, but in the former materially, and in the latter immaterially; viz. in the one impartibly and truly, but in the other partibly and shadowy. Hence every form is in sensibles distributed according to material interval.”
P. [120]. Through the innovation and illegality of the Greeks. Iamblichus says, that through this innovation and illegality, both names and prayers have at present lost their efficacy. For during his time, and forborne centuries prior to it, the genuine religion of the Greeks was rapidly declining, through their novelty and volatility, of which he here complains. Hence the Emperor Julian, in the fragments of his treatise against the Christians, preserved by Ciryl, says, speaking of the Christians, “If any one wishes to consider the truth respecting you, he will find that your impiety consists of the Judaic audacity, and the indolence and confusion of the heathens. For deriving from both, not that which is most beautiful, but the worst, you have fabricated a web of evils.——Hence, from the innovation of the Hebrews, you have seized blasphemy towards the venerable Gods; but from our religion you have cast aside reverence to every nature more excellent than man, and the love of paternal institutes.” Το γαρ αληθες ει τις υπερ υμων εθελοι σκοπειν, ευρησει την υμετεραν ασεβειαν, εκ τε της Ιουδαϊκης τολμης και της παρα τοις εθνεσιν αδιαφοριας και χυδαιοτητος συγκειμενην. εξ αμφοιν γαρ ουτι το καλλιστον αλλα το χειρον ελκυσαντες, παρυφην κακων ειργασασθε.——Απο μεν ουν της Εβραιων καινοτομιας το βλασφημειν τιμωμενους θεους ηρπασατε· απο δε της παρ’ ημιν θρησκειας το μεν ευλαβες τε ομου προς απασαν την κρειττονα φυσιν, και των πατριων αγαπητικον, απολελοιπατε.
P. [122]. Prior to truly existing beings, and total principles, &c. Of the two most ancient principles of all things mentioned in this chapter, as celebrated by Hermes, the first corresponds to the one itself of Plato, and the second to being itself, or superessential being, the summit of the intelligible triad; which two principles are beautifully unfolded by Proclus in the second and third books of his treatise on the Theology of Plato.
P. [122]. He arranges the God Eneph prior to, and as the leader of, the celestial Gods.—But prior to this he arranges the impartible one, which he says is the first paradigm, and which he denominates Eicton. It appears to me that the former of these two divinities is the same with Saturn, who is the summit of the intellectual order of Gods; and that the latter is the animal itself of Plato, or the Phanes of Orpheus, who subsists at the extremity of the intelligible triad. For the God Eneph is said by Iamblichus to be an intellect intellectually perceiving itself, and converting intellections to itself; and these are the characteristics of Saturn. And the God Eicton is said to be the first paradigm, and this is also asserted of Phanes.
P. [123]. For the books which are circulated under the name of Hermes, contain Hermaic opinions, though they frequently employ the language of the philosophers: for they were translated from the Egyptian tongue by men who were not unskilled in philosophy. A few only of these books are now extant, but what is here said by Iamblichus sufficiently proves their authenticity, and that they contain the genuine doctrines of Hermes. They have doubtless, however, been occasionally interpolated by some of the early Christians, though not to that extent which modern critics, and that mitred sophist Warburton, suppose.
P. [123]. And such as have written concerning the decans. The twelve parts, mentioned in the preceding chapter, into which the Egyptians divide the heavens, are the twelve signs of the zodiac. But the thirty-six parts are the twelve houses of the planets, divided into three other portions, which they call decans. Ptolemy, however, in his Quadripartite, subverts this doctrine of the Egyptians. Concerning these decans, see Scaliger ad Manilium, Kircher II. parte Oedipi, and Salmasius de Annis climactericis. Gale also gives the following extract from Hermes relative to the decans, which had not been before published, and which he derived from a MS. copy of Stobæus in the possession of Vossius. Φαμεν ω τεκνον, περιεκτικον των απαντων ειναι το σωμα. εννοησον ουν αυτο ωσπερ κυκλοειδες σχημα——υπο δε τον κυκλον του σωματος τουτου τεταχθαι τους λϛ δεκανους, μεσους του παντος κυκλου του ζωδιακου.——νοησωμεν ωσπερει φυλακας αυτους προϊστασθαι των εν κοσμῳ απαντων παντα συνεχοντας——και τηρουντας την των παντων ευταξιαν.——ετι δε νοησον ω Τατ, οτι απαθεις εισιν ων οι αλλοι αστερες πασχουσιν. ουτε γαρ επεχομενοι τον δρομον στηριζουσιν, ουτε κωλυομενοι αναποδιζουσιν, αλλ’ ουδε μην απο του φωτος του ηλιου σκεπονται, απερ πασχουσιν οι αλλοι αστερες. ελευθεροι δε οντες υπερανω παντων, ωσπερ φυλακες και επισκοποι ακριβεις του παντος, περιεχονται τῳ νυχθημερῳ το παν.——εχουσι προς ημας την μεγιστην δυναμιν. i. e. “We say, O son, that the body [of the universe] is comprehensive of all things. Conceive, therefore, this to be as it were of a circular form.——But under the circle of this body the thirty-six decans are arranged, as the media of the whole circle of the zodiac.——These, likewise, must be understood to preside as guardians over every thing in the world, connecting and containing all things——and preserving the established order of all things.——Farther still, understand, O Tat, that these decans are impassive to the things which the other stars suffer. For neither being detained, do they stop their course, nor being impeded do they recede, nor are they, like the other stars, concealed as with a veil by the light of the sun. But being liberated above all things, they comprehend the universe as the guardians and accurate inspectors of it, in the Nycthemeron [or the space of night and day].——They also possess, with respect to us, the greatest power.”
P. [125]. So that what you add from Homer, “that the Gods are flexible,” it is not holy to assert. The words of Homer are στρεπτοι δε τε και θεοι αυτοι, and are to be found in Iliad ix. v. 493. But when Iamblichus says, it is not holy to assert the Gods are flexible, he means that it is not holy according to the literal signification of the words; divine flexibility indicating nothing more than this, that those who through depravity were before unadapted to receive the illuminations of the Gods, and in consequence of this were subject to the power of avenging dæmons; when afterwards they obtain pardon of their guilt through prayers and sacrifices, and through methods of this kind apply a remedy to their vices, again become partakers of the goodness of the Gods. So that divine flexibility is a resumption of the participation of divine light and goodness by those who through inaptitude were before deprived of it.
P. [130]. Dæmons preside over the parts of our body. Proclus in the fragments of his Ten Doubts concerning Providence, preserved by Fabricius in the eighth vol. of his Bibliotheca Græca, observes, “That the Gods, with an exempt transcendency, extend their providence to all things, but that dæmons, dividing their superessential subsistence, receive the guardianship of different herds of animals, distributing the providence of the Gods, as Plato says, as far as to the most ultimate division. Hence some of them preside over men, others over lions or other animals, and others over plants; and still more partially, some are the inspective guardians of the eye, others of the heart, and others of the liver.” He adds, “all things, however, are full of Gods, some of whom exert their providential energies immediately, but others through dæmons as media: not that the Gods are incapable of being present to all things, but that ultimate are themselves unable to participate primary natures.” Hence it must be said that there is one principal dæmon, who is the guardian and governor of every thing that is in us, and many dæmons subordinate to him, who preside over our parts.
P. [134]. Hence it is requisite to consider how he may be liberated from these bonds. “The one salvation of the soul herself,” says Proclus in Tim. lib. v. p. 330, “which is extended by the Demiurgus, and which liberates her from the circle of generation, from abundant wanderings, and an inefficacious life, is her return to the intellectual form, and a flight from every thing which naturally adheres to us from generation. For it is necessary that the soul, which is hurled like seed into the realms of generation, should lay aside the stubble and bark, as it were, which she obtained from being disseminated into these fluctuating realms; and that purifying herself from every thing circumjacent, she should become an intellectual flower and fruit, delighting in an intellectual life, instead of doxastic nutriment, and pursuing the uniform and simple energy of the period of sameness, instead of the abundantly wandering motion of the period which is characterized by difference. For she contains each of these circles, and twofold powers. And of her horses one is good, but the other the contrary [as is said in the Phædrus]. And one of these leads her to generation, but the other from generation to true being. The one also leads her round the genesiurgic, but the other round the intellectual circle. For the period of the same and the similar elevates to intellect, and an intelligible nature, and to the first and most excellent habit. But this habit is that according to which the soul being winged governs the whole world, becoming assimilated to the Gods themselves. And this is the universal form of life in the soul, just as that is the partial form, when she falls into the last body, and becomes something belonging to an individual, instead of belonging to the universe. The middle of these, also, is the partial universal, when she lives in conjunction with her middle vehicle, as a citizen of generation. Dismissing, therefore, her first habit, which subsists according to an alliance to the whole of generation, and laying aside the irrational nature which connects her with generation, likewise governing her irrational part by reason, and extending opinion to intellect, she will be circularly led to a happy life from the wanderings about the regions of sense; which life those that are initiated by Orpheus in the mysteries of Bacchus and Proserpine, pray that they may obtain, together with the allotments of the [celestial] sphere, and a cessation of evil. But if our soul necessarily lives well, when living according to the circle of sameness, much more must this be the case with divine souls. It is, however, possible for our soul to live according to the circle of sameness, when purified, as Plato says. Cathartic virtue, therefore, alone must be called the salvation of souls; since this cuts off, and vehemently obliterates, material natures, and the passions which adhere to us from generation; separates the soul and leads it to intellect; and causes it to leave on earth the vehicles with which it is invested. For souls in descending receive from the elements different vehicles, aerial, aquatic, and terrestrial; and thus at last enter into this gross bulk. For how, without a medium, could they proceed into this body from immaterial spirits?”
THE END.
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[1]. According to this theology, as I have elsewhere shown, in every order of things, a triad is the immediate progeny of a monad. Hence the intelligible triad proceeds immediately from the ineffable principle of things. Phanes, or intelligible intellect, who is the last of the intelligible order, is the monad, leader, and producing cause of a triad, which is denominated νοητος και νοερος, i. e. intelligible, and at the same time intellectual. In like manner the extremity of this order produces immediately from itself the intellectual triad, Saturn, Rhea, and Jupiter. Again, Jupiter, who is also the Demiurgus, is the monad of the supermundane triad. Apollo, who subsists at the extremity of the supermundane order, produces a triad of liberated Gods. (Θεοι απολυτοι.) And the extremity of the liberated order becomes the monad of a triad of mundane Gods. This theory, too, which is the progeny of the most consummate science, is in perfect conformity with the Chaldean theology. And hence it is said in one of the Chaldean oracles, “In every world a triad shines forth, of which a monad is the ruling principle.” (Παντι γαρ εν κοσμῳ λαμπει τριας ης μονας αρχει). I refer the reader, who is desirous of being fully convinced of all this, to my translation of Proclus on the Theology of Plato.
[2]. Viz. The Philosophical Works of Proclus, together with those of Plotinus, Porphyry, Iamblichus, Syrianus, Ammonius, Damascius, Olympiodorus, and Simplicius.
[3]. Ενα ιδοις αν εν πασα γῃ ομοφωνον νομον και λογον, οτι θεος εις παντων βασιλευς και πατηρ, και θεοι πολλοι, θεου παιδες, συναρχοντες θεῳ. ταυτα και ο ελλην λεγει, και ο βαρβαρος λεγει, και ο ηπειρωτης και ο θαλαττιος, και ο σοφος και ο ασοφος. κᾳν επι του ωκεανου ελθῃς τας ηϊονας, κᾳκει θεοι, τοις μεν ανισχοντες αγχου μαλα, τοις δε καταδυομενοι. Dissert. i. Edit. Princ.
[4]. “Diogenes Laertius says of Pythagoras, that he charged his disciples not to give equal degrees of honour to the Gods and heroes. Herodotus (in Euterpe) says of the Greeks, That they worshiped Hercules two ways, one as an immortal deity, and so they sacrificed to him; and another as a Hero, and so they celebrated his memory. Isocrates (Encom. Helen.) distinguishes between the honours of heroes and Gods, when he speaks of Menelaus and Helena. But the distinction is no where more fully expressed than in the Greek inscription upon the statue of Regilla, wife to Herodes Atticus, as Salmasius thinks, which was set up in his temple at Triopium, and taken from the statue itself by Sirmondus; where it is said, That she had neither the honour of a mortal nor yet that which was proper to the Gods. Ουδε ιερα θνητοις, αταρ ουδε θεοισιν ομοια. It seems by the inscription of Herodes, and by the testament of Epicteta, extant in Greek in the Collection of Inscriptions, that it was in the power of particular families to keep festival days in honour of some of their own family, and to give heroical honours to them. In that noble inscription at Venice, we find three days appointed every year to be kept, and a confraternity established for that purpose with the laws of it. The first day to be observed in honour of the Muses, and sacrifices to be offered to them as deities. The second and third days in honour of the heroes of the family; between which honour and that of deities, they showed the difference by the distance of time between them, and the preference given to the other. But whereinsoever the difference lay, that there was a distinction acknowledged among them appears by this passage of Valerius, in his excellent oration, extant in Dionysius Halicarnass. Antiq. Rom. lib. ii. p. 696. I call, says he, the Gods to witness, whose temples and altars our family has worshiped with common sacrifices; and next after them, I call the Genii of our ancestors, to whom we give δευτερας τιμας, the second honours next to the Gods, (as Celsus calls those, τας προσηκουσας τιμας, the due honours that belong to the lower dæmons.) From which we take notice, that the Heathens did not confound all degrees of divine worship, giving to the lowest object the same which they supposed to be due to the celestial deities, or the supreme God. So that if the distinction of divine worship will excuse from idolatry, the Heathens were not to blame for it.” See Stillingfleet’s Answer to a book entitled Catholics no Idolaters, p. 510, 513, &c.
[5]. See the extracts from Plutarch, in which this is shown, in the Introduction to my translation of Proclus on the Theology of Plato.
[6]. Answer to Catholics no Idolaters. Lond. 1676. p. 211.
[7]. Arrian. de Exped. Alex. l. iv. et Curt. lib. viii.
[8]. Vit. Artaxerx. Ælian. Var. Hist. lib. i. c. 21.
[9]. Justin. lib. vi.
[10]. Panegyr.
[11]. Lib. vii.
[12]. Lib. vi. cap. iii.
[13]. Και κολασεως δε ειδος ειναι αθειαν ουκ απεικος. τους γαρ γνοντας θεους, και καταφρονησαντας, ευλογον εν ετερῳ βιῳ και της γνωσεως στερεσθαι, και τους εαυτων βασιλεας ως θεους τιμησαντας, εδει την δικην αυτων ποιησαι των θεων εκπεσειν. Cap. xviii.
[14]. και χρη τον επι τας αρχας αναβαινοντα ζητειν, ει δυνατον ειναι τι κρειττον της υποτεθεισης αρχης κᾳν ευρεθῃ, παλιν επ’ εκεινου ζητειν, εως αν εις τας ακροτατας εννοιας ελθωμεν, ων ουκετι σεμνοτερας εχομεν· και μη στησαι την αναβασιν. ουδε γαρ ευλαβητεον μη κενεμβατωμεν, μειζονα τινα και υπερβαινοντα τας πρωτας αρχας περι αυτων εννοουντες. ου γαρ δυνατον τηλικουτον πηδημα πηδησαι τας ημετερας εννοιας, ως παρισωθηναι τῃ αξιᾳ των πρωτων αρχων, ου λεγω και υπερπτηναι. μια γαρ αυτη προς θεον ανατασις αριστη, και ως δυνατον απταιστος. και ων εννοουμεν αγαθων τα σεμνοτατα, και αγιωτατα, και πρωτουργα, και ονοματα και πραγματα αυτῳ ανατιθεντας ειδεναι βεβαιως, οτι μηδεν ανατεθεικαμεν αξιον. αρκει δε ημιν εις συγγνωμην, το μηδεν εχειν εκεινων υπερτερον. Simplic. in Epict. Enchir. p. 207. Lond. 1670. 8vo.
[15]. Of the first principles, says Damascius in MS. περι αρχων, the Egyptians said nothing, but celebrated it as a darkness beyond all intellectual conception, a thrice unknown darkness. Πρωτην αρχην ανυμνηκασιν, σκοτος υπερ πασαν νοησιν, σκοτος αγνωστον τρις τουτο επιφημιζοντες.
[16]. For farther particulars respecting this most extraordinary man, see the introduction to my translation of his Life of Pythagoras, and my History of the Restoration of the Platonic Theology.
[17]. Iliad, lib. x. v. 493.
[18]. Gale has omitted to give the original of the sentence contained in the brackets; the translation of which I have added from the answer of Iamblichus to this epistle.
[19]. Here also the original is omitted by Gale, and the translation of it is given by me from the text of Iamblichus.
[20]. The paragraph within the brackets is omitted in the original; but I have supplied it from the following answer of Iamblichus to this Epistle. This omission is not noticed by Gale.
[21]. Here likewise the words within the brackets, which are omitted in the original, are added from Iamblichus; but the omission is not noticed by Gale.
[22]. The following testimony of an anonymous Greek writer, prefixed to the manuscript of this treatise, which Gale published, proves that this work was written by Iamblichus: Ιστεον οτι ο φιλοσοφος Προκλος υπομνηματιζων τας του μεγαλου Πλωτινου εννεαδας, λεγει οτι ο αντιγραφων εις την προκειμενην του Πορφυριου επιστολην, ο θεσπεσιος εστιν Ιαμβλιχος· και δια το της υποθεσεως οικειον και ακολουθον, υποκρινεται προσωπον Αιγυπτιου τινος Αβαμωνος· αλλα και το της λεξεως κομματικον και αφοριστικον, και το των εννοιων πραγματικον, και γλαφυρον, και ενθουν, μαρτυρει τον Προκλον καλως και κριναντα, και ιστορησαντα. i. e. “It is requisite to know that the philosopher Proclus, in his Commentary on the Enneads of the great Plotinus, says that it is the divine Iamblichus who answers the prefixed Epistle of Porphyry, and who assumes the person of a certain Egyptian of the name of Abammon, through the affinity and congruity of the hypothesis. And, indeed, the conciseness and definiteness of the diction, and the efficacious, elegant, and divine nature of the conceptions, testify that the decision of Proclus is just.” That this, indeed, was the opinion of Proclus, is evident from a passage in his Commentaries on the Timæus of Plato, which has escaped the notice of Gale, and which the reader will find in a note on the fourth chapter of the eighth section of the following translation.
[23]. In the original κατα τας κοινας εννοιας, which Gale erroneously translates contra communes opiniones.
[24]. Damascius περι αρχων says, “that difference not existing, there will not be knowledge.” And, “that the contact as of one with one is above knowledge.” Likewise, “that the intellectual perception of the first intelligible is without any difference or distinction. ετεροτητος μη ουσης, μηδε γνωσις εσται. Et συναφη ως ενος προς εν, υπερ γνωσιν. Alibi, διακριτος η του πρωτου νοητου νοησις.
[25]. Between souls that always abide on high with purity, such as the souls of essential heroes, and those that descend into the regions of mortality, and are defiled with vice, such as the souls of the greater part of mankind, the class of undefiled souls subsists. These descend into the realms of generation, partly from that necessity by which all human souls are, at times, drawn down to the earth, and partly for the benevolent purpose of benefiting those of an inferior class. But they descend without being defiled with vice. They are also called heroes, κατα σχεσιν, i. e. according to habitude, in order to distinguish them from essential heroes. And, in the Pythagoric Golden Verses, they are denominated the terrestrial heroes.
[26]. For αυτην εαυτοις ουσαν in this place, it is necessary to read αυτην εαυτης ουσαν.
[27]. For εποχη here, I read μετοχη.
[28]. Viz. In the plenitudes, or total perfections, of the Gods.
[29]. i. e. Without habitude, proximity, or alliance to the things which it illuminates.
[30]. What is here asserted by Iamblichus is perfectly true, and confirmed by experience, viz. that the passions, when moderately gratified, are vanquished without violence. But Gale, not understanding this, says, “Hoc adeo verum est, ac si dixisset, ignem extingues, oleum addendo camino.” For a moderate gratification of the passions does not resemble the pouring of oil on fire; since this similitude is only applicable to them when they are immoderately indulged.
[31]. See my Dissertation on the Eleusinian and Bacchic Mysteries.
[32]. In the original, Και δη, και “αι της μηνιδος εξιλασεις” εσονται σαφεις, εαν την μηνιν των δεων καταμαθωμεν, which Gale most erroneously translates as follows: “Sed et ratio possit reddi supplicationum, quibus divinam iram procuramus, si recte intelligamus, qualis sit deorum ira.”
[33]. Viz. Punishments produced by the realms of generation, or the sublunary region.
[34]. It is well observed by Proclus, “that divine necessity concurs with the divine will.” Θεια αναγκη συντρεχει τῃ θειᾳ βουλησει. Procl. in Tim. lib. i.
[35]. For νοητον here, it is obviously necessary to read νοερον.
[36]. For τουτο here, it is necessary to read ταυτο.
[37]. For as a celestial body consists of light so pure and simple, that, compared with a terrestrial body, it may be said to be immaterial; hence, like the light of the sun, it cannot be divided, or in other words, one part of it cannot be separated from another.
[38]. For προς αυτην in this place, I read προς αυτα.
[39]. The nature of the one, as it is all-receptive, and all-productive (πανδεχης και παντοφυης) exhibits in itself a certain representation and indication of multitude; for it is all things prior to all.
[40]. For the Gods are essentialized in the one; or, as Damascius observes, speaking Chaldaically, in the paternal peculiarity. For in every God there is father, power, and intellect; father being the same as hyparxis and the one.
[41]. Viz. According to the difference which there is between the invisibility of Gods and the invisibility of dæmons.
[42]. The cosmocrators, or governors of the world, are the planets. See the fourth book of my translation of Proclus on the Timæus of Plato.
[43]. For πυριως in this place, I read εμπυριως. For the empyrean world, according to the Chaldeans, is above the material worlds, and emits a supermundane fire or light.
[44]. For περιουσια here, it is necessary to read παρουσια.
[45]. These are terrestrial dæmons, to whom the Chaldean oracle alludes, which says, “The wild beasts of the earth shall inhabit thy vessel,” i. e. as Psellus explains it, the composite temperature of the soul.
[46]. For πεπλανημενην here, it seems requisite to read πεπλασμενην. Gale also, in his version, in this place has fictum.
[47]. i. e. The inexplicable theurgic signs or symbols.
[48]. For υπνος here, it is necessary to read αυπνος. For Iamblichus has before shown that divine dreams are not produced in sleep, but either when sleep leaves us, or between sleeping and waking, or when we are perfectly awake. The necessity of this emendation is also evident from what Iamblichus shortly after adds, viz. that we must take away from divine dreams the being asleep; i. e. the being in a profound sleep.
[49]. In the original there is nothing more than λεγουσι δε ταδε in this place; but the sense requires that we should read λεγουσι δε οι σοφοι ταδε. And this emendation is confirmed by the versions of Scutellius and Gale.
[50]. For κατα τα μεταξυ διαλαμβανομενα κ. λ, I read μετα κ. λ.
[51]. “Among the deeds of Pythagoras,” says Iamblichus, in his Life of that father of philosophy, (chap. xxv.) “it is said, that once through the spondaic [i. e. Doric] song of a piper he extinguished the rage of a Tauromenian lad, who had been feasting by night, and intended to burn the vestibule of his mistress, in consequence of seeing her coming from the house of his rival. For the lad was inflamed and excited [to this rash attempt] by a Phrygian song; which, however, Pythagoras most rapidly suppressed. But Pythagoras, as he was astronomizing, happened to meet with the Phrygian piper at an unseasonable time of night, and persuaded him to change his Phrygian for a spondaic song; through which the fury of the lad being immediately repressed, he returned home in an orderly manner, though a little before this he could not be in the least restrained, nor would, in short, bear any admonition; and even stupidly insulted Pythagoras when he met him. When a certain youth, also, rushed with a drawn sword on Anchilus, the host of Empedocles, because, being a judge, he had publicly condemned his father to death, and would have slain him as a homicide, Empedocles changed the intention of the youth, by singing to his lyre that verse of Homer,
Nepenthe, without gall, o’er every ill
Oblivion spreads.
Odyss. lib. 4.
And thus snatched his host Anchilus from death, and the youth from the crime of homicide. It is also related, that the youth from that time became the most celebrated of the disciples of Pythagoras. Farther still, the whole Pythagoric school produced, by certain appropriate songs, what they called exartysis, or adaptation; synarmoga, or elegance of manners; and epaphe, or contact, usefully conducting the dispositions of the soul to passions contrary to those which it before possessed. For when they went to bed, they purified the reasoning power from the perturbations and noises to which it had been exposed during the day, by certain odes and peculiar songs, and by this means procured for themselves tranquil sleep, and few and good dreams. But when they rose from bed, they again liberated themselves from the torpor and heaviness of sleep, by songs of another kind. Sometimes, also, by musical sounds alone, unaccompanied with words, they healed the passions of the soul and certain diseases, enchanting, as they say, in reality. And it is probable that from hence this name epode, i. e. enchantment, came to be generally used. After this manner, therefore, Pythagoras, through music, produced the most beneficial correction of human manners and lives.”
Proclus also, in his MS. Commentary on the First Alcibiades of Plato, observes, “that of musical instruments some are repressive, and others motive; some are adapted to rest, and others to motion. The repressive, therefore, are most useful for education, leading our manners into order, repressing the turbulency of youth, and bringing its agitated nature to quietness and temperance. But the motive instruments are adapted to enthusiastic energy; and hence, in the mysteries and mystic sacrifices, the pipe is useful; for the motive power of it is employed for the purpose of exciting the reasoning power to a divine nature. For here it is requisite that the irrational part should be laid asleep, and the rational excited. Hence those that instruct youth use repressive instruments, but initiators such as are motive. For that which is disciplined is the irrational part; but it is reason which is initiated, and which energizes enthusiastically.”
See, likewise, on this subject, Ptolem. Harmonic, lib. iii. cap. 7 and 8, who observes among other things, “that our souls directly sympathize with the energies of melody, recognizing, as it were, their alliance to them—and that at one time the soul is changed to a quiet and repressed condition, but at another to fury and enthusiasm. Ταις ενεργειαις της μελῳδιας συμπασχειν ημων αντικρυς τας ψυχας, την συγγενειαν ωσπερ επιγινωσκουσας——et, ποτε μεν εις ησυχιαν και κατασολην τρεπεσθαι, ποτε δε εις οἱσρον και ενθυσιασμον. And, in the last place, see Plato in his Io, and Aristotle in his Politics.
[52]. Proclus in Polit. p. 865, says, “that the melodies of Olympus were the causes of ecstasy.” Τα του Ολυμπου μελη εκσατικα.
[53]. The nature of the Corybantes, and the order to which they belong, is unfolded as follows by Proclus, in Plat. Theol. lib. vi. cap. 13. “To what has been said we shall add the theory pertaining to the unpolluted[[54]] Gods among the ruling divinities [i. e. among the divinities that subsist immediately after the intellectual Gods]. For Plato also gives us an opportunity of mentioning these, since it is necessary that the rulers and leaders of wholes should subsist analogous to the intellectual kings, though they make their progression in conjunction with division, and a separation into parts. For as they imitate the paternal generative and convertive powers of the intellectual kings, thus also it is necessary that they should receive the immutable monads in themselves, according to the ruling peculiarity, and establish over their own progressions secondary causes of a guardian characteristic. And the mystic tradition, indeed, of Orpheus makes mention of these more clearly. But Plato being persuaded by the mysteries, and by what is performed in them, indicates concerning these unpolluted Gods. And in the Laws, indeed, he reminds us of the inflation of the pipe by the Corybantes, which represses every inordinate and tumultuous motion. But in the Euthydemus, he makes mention of the collocation on a throne, which is performed in the Corybantic mysteries; just as in other dialogues he mentions the Curetic order, speaking of the armed sports of the Curetes. For the Curetes are said to surround and to dance round the Demiurgus of wholes, when he was unfolded into light from Rhea. In the intellectual Gods, therefore, the first Curetic order is allotted its hypostasis. But the order of the Corybantes, which precedes Core [i. e. Proserpine], and guards her on all sides, as the theology says, is analogous to the Curetes in the intellectual order. If, however, you are willing to speak conformably to Platonic custom, because these divinities preside over purity, and preserve the Curetic order undefiled, and also preserve immutability in their generations, and stability in their progressions[[55]] into the worlds, on this account they were called Corybantes. For το κορον, to koron, is every where significant of purity, as Socrates says in the Cratylus; since, also, you may say that our mistress Core was no otherwise denominated than from purity and an unpolluted life. But, in consequence of her alliance to this order, she produces twofold guardian triads, one in conjunction with her father, but the other herself by and from herself, imitating in this respect the whole vivific Goddess [Rhea] who constitutes the first Curetes.”
[54]. These Gods are called unpolluted, because they are the causes of purity. For every God begins his own energy from himself, and is that primarily which his effects are secondarily.
[55]. For περιοδοις here, it is necessary to read προοδοις.
[56]. Servius, in commenting on the “Mystica vannus Iacchi” of Virgil, observes, that the sacred rites of Bacchus pertained to the purification of souls, “Liberi patris sacra ad purgationem animarum pertinebant.” And elsewhere he says, “Animæ aere ventilantur, quod erat in sacris Liberi purgationis genus.” Euripides also, in Bacchis, exclaims,
Ω μακαρ οστις ευδαιμων τελετας Θεων
Ειδως, βιοταν αγιστευει,
Και θιασευεται ψυχαν,
Εν ορεσι βακχευων
Οσιοισι καθαρμοις.
i. e. “O blessed and happy he, who knowing the mysteries of the Gods, sanctifies his life, and purifies his soul, celebrating orgies in the mountains, with holy purifications.”
[57]. “In the greatest diseases and labours (says Plato in the Phædrus) to which certain persons are sometimes subject through the ancient indignation of the Gods, in consequence of former guilt, mania when it takes place, predicting what they stand in need of, discovers a liberation from such evils by flying to prayer and the worship of the Gods. Hence, obtaining by this means purifications and the advantages of initiation, it renders him who possesses it free from disasters both for the present and future time, by discovering to him who is properly insane, and possessed by divinity, a solution of the present evils.” And the Platonic Hermias beautifully unfolds the meaning of this ancient indignation of the Gods, through former guilt, as follows: “Offences which have been committed for a great length of a time, are more difficult to be washed away, and a liberation from them can alone be effected by the telestic art; but those that have been committed for a shorter time are more easily cured. Thus, also, we see in the medical art, that maladies which have existed but for a little time, if they are paid attention to at their commencement, are easily remedied, but that when they are of long standing, they are more difficultly healed. For the evil in this case becomes as it were natural and confirmed by habit, and resembles an indurated ulcer. A similar thing to this, therefore, takes place in guilty conduct. Hence, if he who has committed an injury, immediately repents, and acknowledges his guilt to him whom he has injured, he dissolves the injury, and renders himself no longer obnoxious to justice. But when some one dissolves an injury committed by his father, by restoring, for instance, land which he had unjustly taken, he then makes himself to be unobnoxious to justice, and lightens and benefits the soul of his father. These things, however, the telestic art more swiftly remedies. Moreover, if it should happen that the whole race of some one successively use land which had originally been plundered, in this case, the injury in the first place becomes immanifest, and on this account is more difficult to be cured; and, in the next place, time causes the evil to become as it were natural. Hence the Gods frequently predict to men that they should go to such or such places, and that an apology should be made to this man, who was never known to them, and that he should be appeased, in order that thus they may obtain a remedy and be liberated from their difficulties, and that the punishments inflicted on them by the Furies may cease. The Gods, however, predict, not for the purpose of taking away punishment, but in order that justice may be done, and that we may be amended. The telestic art, therefore, renders him better who possesses the mania which it imparts, and through him saves also many others. Thus, for instance, it is related of one who was cutting down an oak, and though he was called on by a Nymph not to cut it down, yet persisted in felling it, that he was punished for so doing by the avenging Furies, that he was in want of necessary food, and that if at any time he met with it, it was immediately taken from him, till one who possessed the telestic art told him to raise an altar and sacrifice to this Nymph, for thus he would be liberated from his calamities. Another person, likewise, who had slain his mother, was freed from the punishment inflicted on him by the Furies by migrating to another country, conformably to the mandate of divinity, and there fixing his abode.”
[58]. This is because Rhea, the mother of the Gods, is a vivific Goddess, being filled indeed (says Proclus, in Plat. Theol. lib. v. c. xi.) from the father prior to her [i. e. from Saturn] with intelligible and prolific power, but filling the Demiurgus [Jupiter], who derives his existence from her, with vivific abundance.
[59]. See, concerning this oracle, Scholiastes Apollonii ad i. librum, et Tacitus ii. Annal.
[60]. This oracle is mentioned by Herodotus, l. i., by Strabo, l. xiv. and by Ammian. Marcell. lib. xxix.
[61]. See Plutarch in his treatise De Defectu Oraculorum.
[62]. See Plutarch in the above mentioned treatise. Concerning this luciform spirit, or vehicle, which is immortal, and which is called by Olympiodorus αυγοειδες χιτων, a luciform vestment, see my Translation of the fifth book of Proclus on the Timæus.
[63]. It was usual for those who prophesied to carry a wand. Tiresias had a sceptre, and Abaris an arrow. The Scholiast on Nicander says, that the Egyptian and Scythian magi, and also many of those in Europe, prophesied with wands. And Eustathius on the Odyssey, p. 1657, observes, “that there is a certain magic in divine wands,” esse in ραβδοις θειοις τινα μαγειαν.
[64]. That is, to partake of an illumination, which has no σχεσις, or habitude, to any thing material.
[65]. For ἡ προιουσα here, it seems necessary to read ἢ προιουσα.
[66]. Proclus, in his MS. Commentary on the First Alcibiades of Plato, observes, “that in the mysteries some one of the more imperfect dæmons assumes the appearance of one that is more perfect, and draws down to himself souls that are not yet purified, and separates them from the Gods. Hence, in the most holy of the mysteries [i. e. in the Eleusinian mysteries], prior to the manifest presence of the God [who is invoked], certain terrene dæmons present themselves to the view, disturbing those that are initiated, divulsing them from undefiled good, and exciting them to matter. On this account the Gods [in the Chaldean oracles] order us not to behold them, till we are guarded by the powers imparted by the mysteries. For they say,
Ου γαρ χρη κεινους σε βλεπειν πριν σωμα τελεσθεις.
i. e. It is not proper you should behold them till your body is purified by initiation. And they add the reason,
Οτι τας ψυχας θελγοντες αει τελετων απαγουσι,
i. e. For these dæmons alluring souls, always draw them away from the mysteries.
Conformably to this, also, Proclus in Plat. Theol. p. 7, says, ωσπερ εν ταις των τελετων αγιωταταις φασι τους μυστας, την μεν πρωτην πολυειδεσι, και πολυμορφοις των θεων προβεβλημενοις γενεσιν απανταν, εισιοντας δε, ακλινεις, και ταις τελεταις πεφραγμενους, αυτην την θειαν ελλαμψιν ακραιφνως εγκολπιζεσθαι, και γυμνιτας (ως αν εκεινοι φαιεν) του θειου μεταλαμβανειν, τον αυτον οιμαι τροπον και εν τη θεωριᾳ των ολων. i. e. “As in the most holy of the mysteries, they say, that the mystics at first meet with the multiform and many shaped genera [i. e. with evil dæmons], which are hurled forth before the Gods, but on entering the interior parts of the temple, unmoved, and guarded by the mystic rites, they genuinely receive in their bosom divine illumination, and divested of their garments, as they would say, participate of a divine nature; the same mode, as it appears to me, takes place in the speculation of wholes.”
That mitred sophist, Warburton, as I have elsewhere called him, from not understanding the former part of this latter extract from Proclus, ridiculously translates the words πολυειδεσι και πολυμορφοις των θεων προβεβλημενοις γενεσιν, “multiform shapes and species, that prefigure the first generation of the Gods.” See his Divine Legation of Moses, book ii. p. 152, 8vo. a work replete with distorted conceptions and inaccurate translations. And yet, as great a sophist as Warburton was, and notwithstanding the work I have just mentioned abounds with false opinions, and such as are of the most pernicious kind, yet he is compelled by truth to acknowledge, in book ii. p. 172, “that the wisest and best men in the Pagan world are unanimous in this, that the mysteries were instituted pure, and proposed the noblest end by the worthiest means.” But this by the way.
[67]. This divination according to the imagination through water, may be illustrated by the following extract from Damascius (apud Photium): Γυνη ιερα θεομοιρον εχουσα φυσιν παρᾳλογοτατην. υδωρ γαρ εγχεασα ακραιφνες ποτηριῳ τινι των υαλινων, εωρα κατα του υδατος εισω του ποτηριου τα φασματα των εσομενων πραγματων, και προυλεγεν απο της οψεως αυτα απερ εμελλεν εσεσθαι παντως. η δε πειρα του πραγματος ουκ ελαθεν ημας. i. e. “There was a sacred woman who possessed in a wonderful manner a divinely gifted nature. For pouring pure water into a certain glass cup, she saw in the water that was within the cup the luminous appearances of future events, and from the view of these she entirely predicted what would happen. But of this experiment we also are not ignorant.”
[68]. “The Platonists,” says Psellus (ad Nazianzenum) “assert that light is spread under divine substances, and is rapidly seized, without any difficulty, by some who possess such an excellent nature as that which fell to the lot of Socrates and Plotinus. But others, at certain periods, experience a mental alienation about the light of the moon.”
[69]. Concerning this vehicle, in which the phantastic power resides, see vol. ii. of my translation of Proclus on the Timæus of Plato, p. 407; the Introduction to my translation of Aristotle on the Soul; and the long extract from Synesius on Dreams, in vol. ii. of my Proclus on Euclid.
[70]. i. e. The discursive energy of reason.
[71]. Proclus in Plat. Polit. having observed that Socrates in the Phædrus, when he speaks in a divinely inspired manner, and poetically adopts such names as are employed by the poets, and says that it is not possible for one who speaks with an insane [i. e. with an inspired] mouth to abstain from them, adds “that an alliance to the dæmoniacal genus, preparing the soul for the reception of divine light, excites the phantasy to symbolic narration.” Η προς δαιμονιον γενος οικειοτης, η προευτρεπιζουσα την του θειου φωτος παρουσιαν, ανακινει την φαντασιαν εις την συμβολικην απαγγελιαν. p. 396.
[72]. These words of Heraclitus are also quoted by Plutarch in his treatise De Defectu Oraculorum.
[73]. For εικονων here, I read ειδων.
[74]. Herodian, lib. viii. observes, that the Italians very much believed in the indications of future events through the viscera: and Strabo, lib. xvii. asserts the same thing.
[75]. The auspices were said to be pestiferous when there was no heart in the entrails, or when the head was wanting in the liver. This was the case with the animals that were sacrificed by Cæsar on the day in which he was slain. The same thing also happened to Caius Marius, when he was sacrificing at Utica. But when Pertinax was sacrificing, both the heart and the liver of the victim were wanting, whence his death was predicted, which happened shortly after. In the sacrifices, likewise, which Marcellus performed prior to the unfortunate battle with the Carthaginians, the liver was found to be without a head, as Plutarch and Livy, Pliny and Valerius Maximus relate.
[76]. Gale observes that this appears to have been a very ancient mode of divination, and does not differ from that which is comprehended under the term wood. Hence the Scholiast, in Nicandri Theriaca, says, “that the Magi and Scythians predicted from the wood of the tamarisk.” For in many places they predict from rods. And that Dinon, in the first book of his third Syntaxis, observes, “that the Median diviners predict from rods.” The Scholiast likewise adds the testimony of Metrodorus, who says, “that the tamarisk is a most ancient plant, and that the Egyptians, in the solemnity of Jupiter, were crowned with the tamarisk, and also the Magi among the Medes.” He adds, “that Apollo also ordained that prophets should predict from this plant, and that in Lesbos he wears a tamarisk crown, has often been seen thus adorned, and that in consequence of this he was called by the Lesbians μυρικαιον, Muricaion, [from μυρικη, the tamarisk].” What the Scholiast here says, is confirmed by Herodotus, in lib. iv. and elsewhere. To this, also, what every where occurs about prediction from the laurel pertains. For if the leaves of the laurel when committed to the fire made a noise, it was considered as a good omen, but if they made none, a bad one.
[77]. Gale, in his translation, has totally mistaken the meaning of the original in this place, and it is not unusual with him to do so. For the original is αλλ’ ουδε ως οργανον τι μεσον εξι το των κρειττονων αιτιον, και δρα δια του θεσπιζοντος ο καλων. This he thus translates: “Sed neque dicendum est fatidicum animum esse instrumentum intermedium divinorum, sacerdotem vero invocantem esse tanquam efficientem causam.” In consequence, also, of this mistake, he erroneously conceives that Iamblichus dissents from himself.
[78]. God is all things causally, and is able to effect all things. He likewise does produce all things, yet not by himself alone, but in conjunction with those divine powers which continually germinate, as it were, from him, as from a perennial root. Not that he is in want of these powers to the efficacy of his productive energy, but the universe requires their cooperation, in order to the distinct subsistence of its various parts and different forms. For as the essence of the first cause, if it be lawful so to speak, is full of deity, his immediate energy must be deific, and his first progeny must be Gods. But as he is ineffable and superessential, all things proceed from him ineffably and superessentially. For progressions are conformable to the characteristics of the natures from which they proceed. Hence the cooperating energy of his first progeny is necessary to the evolution of things into effable, essential, and distinct subsistence. The supreme God, therefore, is, as Iamblichus justly observes, alone worthy of sedulous attention, esteem, the energy of reason, and felicitous honour; but this is not to the exclusion of paying appropriate attention and honour to other powers that are subordinate to him, who largely participate of his divinity, and are more or less allied to him. For in reverencing and paying attention to these appropriately, we also attend to and reverence him. For that which we sedulously attend to, honour, and esteem in them, is that alone which is of a deified nature, and is therefore a portion, as it were, of the ineffable principle of all things.
Gale, from not understanding this, exclaims, “if these things are true, (viz. that God is alone worthy of sedulous attention, &c.) as they are, indeed, most true, to what purpose, O Iamblichus, is that mighty study and labour about dæmons and other spirits?” But the answer to this, by regarding what has been above said, is easy. For mighty study and labour about these intermediate powers is necessary, in order to our union with their ineffable cause. For as we are but the dregs of the rational nature, and the first principle of things is something so transcendent as to be even beyond essence, it is impossible that we should be united to him without media; viz. without the Gods, and their perpetual attendants, who are on this account the true saviours of souls. For in a union with the supreme deity our true salvation consists.
[79]. For these conceptions and these works teach us, that in reality we, through sacred operations, approach to divinity, but that divinity does not draw near to us. Hence Proclus in Alcibiad. εν ταις κλησεσι, και εν ταις αυτοψιαις προσιεναι πως ημιν φαινεται το θειον, ημων επανατεινομενων επ’ αυτο. i. e. “In invocations of the Gods, and when they are clearly seen, divinity, in a certain respect, appears to approach to us, though it is we that are extended to him.”
[80]. Gale, in his note on these words, after having observed that Porphyry says, that ignorance, darkness, and folly attend the soul in its lapse into body; and that, according to Servius, the soul, when it begins to descend into body, drinks of folly and oblivion, quotes also Irenæus (lib. ii. c. 59), who makes the following stupid remark: “Souls entering into this life [it is said] drink of oblivion, before they enter into bodies, from the dæmon who is above this ingress. But whence do you know this, O Plato, since your soul also is now in body? For if you remember the dæmon, the cup, and the entrance, it is likewise requisite that you should know the rest.” To this it is easy to reply, that a soul purified and enlightened by philosophy, like that of Plato, is able to recognise many things pertaining to its preexistent state, even while in the present body, in consequence of partially emerging from corporeal darkness and oblivion; but that it is not capable of knowing every thing distinctly, till it is perfectly liberated from the delirium of the body. And Gale, no less sillily, adds, “respondebunt Platonici hæc omnia cognovisse Platonem ex narratione, quæ circumferebatur de Ere Armenio, qui Lethes aquam non biberat.” i. e. “The Platonists will answer that Plato knew all these things from the narration of the Armenian Erus [in the Republic] who did not drink of the water of Lethe.” For Plato did not obtain this knowledge from any historical narration, but from possessing in a transcendent degree the cathartic and theoretic virtues, and from energizing enthusiastically (or according to a divinely inspired energy) through the latter of these virtues.
[81]. Agreeably to this, Porphyry says in his Αφορμαι προς τα νοητα, or Auxiliaries to Intelligibles, ψυχη καταδειται προς το σωμα, τῃ επιστροφη τῃ προς τα παθη τα απ’ αυτου.——And ψυχη εδησεν εαυτην εν τῳ σωματι. i. e. “The soul is bound to the body, by a conversion to the passions arising from her union with it.” And, “the soul binds herself in the body.” Philolaus also says, that the ancient theologists and prophets asserted, ως δια τινας τιμωριας α ψυχα τῳ σωματι συνεζευκται, και καθαπερ εν σαματι τουτῳ τεθαπται, “that the soul is conjoined to the body on account of certain punishments, and that it is buried in it as in a sepulchre.”
[82]. This assertion, that the nature which is perfectly exempt can never become one with that which departs from itself, is opposed by Gale, who says that man is composed of soul and body, and yet the latter is far inferior to, and less excellent than, the former. But in adducing this instance, he clearly shows that he does not understand what Iamblichus says. For the human soul being a medium between a certain impartible and partible essence, so far as it partakes of the partible essence, has a certain alliance with body, and is not perfectly exempt from it. But this is not the case with divine inspiration and our soul: for the former in a perfectly exempt manner transcends the latter. Let it, therefore, be granted him that, as Psellus says, “hypostatic union conducts different essences or natures to one hypostasis,” yet such a union can never take place between two things, one of which has no habitude, proximity, or alliance to the other. Gale was led into this mistake by not properly attending to the words perfectly exempt, το παντελως εξῃρημενον, which are here employed by Iamblichus. But such mistakes are usual with Gale, from his inaccurate and rambling manner of thinking. He likewise forgot, at the time he was writing notes on Iamblichus, that he was the master of a grammar school, and not a philosopher.
From what has been said, the absurdity, also, of their opinion is immediately obvious, who fancy that the divine essence can be mingled and united with the mortal nature. For if such a union were possible, it would benefit and exalt the latter, but injure and degrade the former. Just as in the union of the rational soul with the body (as Proclus beautifully observes in Tim. p. 339), “the former, by verging to a material life, kindles indeed a light in the body, but becomes herself situated in darkness; and by giving life to the body, destroys both herself and her own intellect [in as great a degree as these are capable of receiving destruction]. For thus the mortal nature participates of intellect, but the intellectual part of death, and the whole, as Plato observes in the Laws, becomes a prodigy composed of the mortal and the immortal, of the intellectual and that which is deprived of intellect. For this physical law which binds the soul to the body is the death of the immortal life, but vivifies the mortal body.”
[83]. Here again Gale, from not understanding, opposes Iamblichus. For he says, “sed nec hoc sequitur. S. Maximus, ubi hypostaticam unionem declarat; hæc inquit, cernuntur in corpore et anima. Una ex utroque confit hypostasis composita. Servat autem in se naturam perfectam utriusque sc. corporis et animæ, και την τουτων διαφοραν ασυμφυρτον και τα ιδιωματα ασυμφυρτα και ασυγχυτα.” i. e. “But neither does this follow. S. Maximus, where he unfolds hypostatic union, says these things are perceived in the soul and body. One composite hypostasis is produced from both. But this hypostasis preserves in itself the perfect nature of each, and likewise the difference of these unmingled, end the peculiarities unmingled and unconfused.” This hypostatic union, however; as we have before observed, cannot take place between divine inspiration and the soul, because the former is perfectly exempt from the latter.
Gale adds, “Quæro autem quid velit Iamblichus per αμφοιν? Opinor, ψυχην et την εξωθεν θειαν επιπνοιαν. Non facile evincet επιπνοιαν esse αιδιον τι, utpote quæ sit transiens dei actio.” i. e. “I ask what Iamblichus means by both. I think the soul and divine inspiration externally derived. But he will not easily prove that inspiration is something eternal, because it is a transient energy of God.” Gale is right in his conjecture, that Iamblichus by the word both in this place, means the soul and divine inspiration externally derived; for it can admit of no other meaning; but when he adds, that inspiration cannot be something eternal, because it is a transient energy of divinity, he shows himself to be as bad a theologist as he is a philosopher. For God being an eternal, or rather a supereternal nature, his energies have nothing to do with time and its transitive progressions, but are stably simultaneous; so that transition does not exist in his inspiring influence, but in the recipients of it, these being of a temporal and mutable nature. Hence it is just as absurd to call any energy of divinity transient, as it would be to say that the light of the sun is transient, because it shines through diaphanous, but not through opaque, substances.
[84]. Hippocrates was of opinion that physicians ought to be skilled in astronomy. And Galen derides those physicians who deny that astronomy is necessary to their art. See his treatise entitled Si quis sit Medicus eundem esse philosophum. And in lib. viii. cap. 20, of his treatise De Ingenio Sanitatis, he calls physicians that are ignorant of astronomy homicides. But by astronomy here, both Hippocrates and Galen intended to signify what is now called astrology. Roger Bacon also, in his Epistle to Pope Clement, says, “Opera quæ fiunt hic inferius, variantur secundum diversitatem cœlestium constellationum, ut opera medicinæ et alkimiæ.” i. e. “The works which are performed in these inferior realms are varied according to the diversity of the celestial constellations, as, for instance, the works of medicine and alchemy.” If, however, as Galen says, and doubtless with great truth, physicians that are ignorant of this are homicides, how numerous must the medical homicides be of the present age!
[85]. According to Proclus, in Alcibiad. Prior, there are three orders of dæmons, the first of which are more intellectual, the second are of a more rational nature, and the third, of which Iamblichus is now speaking, are various, more irrational, and more material.
[86]. Charonea is a country of Asia Minor, bordering on the river Meander; and in it there are spiracles which exhale a foul odour. According to Pliny, there are places of this kind in Italy, in the country of Puteoli, now Puzzulo. In Amsanctus, also, a place in the middle of Italy, in the country of the Samnites, there were sulphureous waters, the steams of which were so pestilential, that they killed all who came near them. Hence Cicero, in lib. i. De Divin. “Quid enim? Non videmus, quam sint varia terrarum genera? Ex quibus et mortifera quædam pars est, ut et Amsancti in Hirpinis, et in Asia Plutonia.”
[87]. And these irrational spirits, so far as they contribute to wholes, are more excellent than we are, though through being irrational they are inferior to us.
[88]. See the justice of providence in this respect most admirably defended by Plotinus, in the first of his treatises on Providence, which treatise forms one of the five books of Plotinus translated by me, in 8vo. 1794.
[89]. In the original, την ιδιαν της ψυχης αυτοπραγιαν, which Gale very inadequately translates proprium animæ officium.
[90]. See my translation of Proclus on the Subsistence of Evil, at the end of my translation of his six books on the Theology of Plato.
[91]. See cap. 40, 41, 42, of Eunead iv. lib. iv. of Plotinus, from which the doctrine of this chapter is derived.
[92]. Agreeably to this, Plotinus, also, in Eunead iv. lib. iv. cap. 32, says, παν τουτο το εν, και ως ζωον εν ζωον τε οντος, και εις εν τελουντος, ουδεν ουτω πορρω τοπου ως μη εγγυς ειναι τη του ενος ζωου προς το συμπαθειν ψυσει, i. e. “This universe is one, and is as one animal. But being an animal and completely effecting one thing, nothing in it is so distant in place as not to be near to the nature of the one animal, on account of its sympathy with the whole of itself.”
[93]. This art is no other than magic, of which the following account, from a very rare Greek manuscript of Psellus, On Dæmons according to the Dogmas of the Greeks, will, I doubt not, be acceptable to the reader, as it illustrates what is here said by Iamblichus, and shows that magic is not an empty name, but possesses a real power, though at present this art seems to be totally lost. Ficinus published some extracts from this manuscript in Latin; but Gale does not appear to have had it in his possession. Η γοητεια δε εστι τεχνη τις περι τους ενυλους και χθονιους δαιμονας φαντασιοσκοπουσα τοις εποπταις τα τουτων ειδωλα. και τους μεν ωσπερ εξ αδου αναγουσα, τους δε υψοθεν καταγουσα, και τουτους κακωτικους. και ειδωλα αττα υφιστησι φαντασματα τοις θεωροις των τουτων. και τοις μεν ρευματα τινα εκειθεν κυμαινοντα επαφιησι· τοις δε δεσμων ανεσεις και τρυφας, και χαριτας επαγγελλεται. επαγεται δε τας τοιαυτας δυναμεις, και ασμασι και επασμασιν. η δε μαγεια πολυδυναμον τι χρημα τοις Ελλησιν εδοξε. μεριδα γουν ειναι ταυτην φασιν εσχατην της ιερατικης επιστημης. ανιχνευουσα γαρ των υπο την σεληνην παντων την τε ουσαν και φυσιν, και δυναμιν και ποιοτητα. λεγω δε στοιχειων και των τουτων μεριδων, ζωων, παντοδαπων φυτων, και των εντευθεν καρπων, λιθων, βοτανων, και απλως ειπειν, παντος πραγματος, υποστασιν τε και δυναμιν. εντευθεν αρα τα εαυτης εργαζεται. αγαλματα τε υφιστησιν υγειας περιποιητικα, και σχηματα ποιειται παντοδαμα· και νοσοποια δεμιουργηματα ετερα. και αετοι μεν, και δρακοντες, βιωσιμοι αυτοις προς υγειαν υποθεσις´ αιλουροι δε και κυνες, και κορακες αγρυπνητικα συμβολα. κηρος δε και πηλος εις τας των μοριων συμπλασεις παραλαμβανονται. φανταζει δε πολλακις, και πυρος ουρανιου εδοσεις, και διαμειδιωσι επι τουτων αγαλματα· πυρί δε αυτοματῳ λαμπαδες αναπτονται. i. e. “Goeteia, or witchcraft, is a certain art respecting material and terrestrial dæmons, whose images it causes to become visible to the spectators of this art. And some of these dæmons it leads up, as it were from Hades, but others it draws down from on high; and these, too, such as are of an evil species. This art, therefore, causes certain phantastic images to appear before the spectators. And before the eyes of some, indeed, it pours exuberant streams; but to others it promises freedom from bonds, delicacies, and favours. They draw down, too, powers of this kind by songs and incantations. But magic, according to the Greeks, is a thing of a very powerful nature. For they say that this forms the last part of the sacerdotal science. Magic, indeed, investigates the nature, power, and quality of every thing sublunary; viz. of the elements, and their parts, of animals, all-various plants and their fruits, of stones, and herbs: and in short, it explores the essence and power of every thing. From hence, therefore, it produces its effects. And it forms statues which procure health, makes all-various figures, and things which become the instruments of disease. It asserts, too, that eagles and dragons contribute to health; but that cats, dogs, and crows are symbols of vigilance, to which, therefore, they contribute. But for the fashioning of certain parts wax and clay are used. Often, too, celestial fire is made to appear through magic; and then statues laugh, and lamps are spontaneously enkindled.”
This curious passage throws light on the following extract from the first book of the Metaphorsis of Apuleius: “Magico susurranime, amnes agiles reverti, mare pigrum colligari, ventos inanimes expirare, solem inhiberi, lunam despumari, stellas evelli, diem tolli, noctem teneri.” i. e. “By magical incantation rapid rivers may be made to run back to their fountains, the sea be congealed, winds become destitute of spirit, the sun be held back in his course, the moon be forced to scatter her foam, the stars be torn from their orbits, the day be taken away, and the night be detained.” For it may be inferred from Psellus, that witches formerly were able to cause the appearance of all this to take place. It must also be observed, that this MS. of Psellus On Dæmons forms no part of his treatise On the Energy of Dæmons, published by Gaulminus; for it never was published.
[94]. Hence Iamblichus (apud Stob. Eclog. Phys. p. 114), says, Ουχ η αυτη εστι πασων ψυχων κοινωνια προς τα σωματα. αλλ’ η μεν ολη ωσπερ Πλωτινῳ δοκει, προσιον εαυτῃ το σωμα εχει εν εαυτῃ, αλλ’ ουκ αυτη προσεισι τῳ σωματι, ουδε περιεχεται υπ’ αυτου. αι δε μερισται προσερχονται τοις σωμασι, και των σωματων γιγνονται. i. e. “There is not the same communion of all souls with bodies; but the soul which ranks as a whole (as it also appeared to Plotinus), approaching to itself, contains body in itself, but does not itself approach to body, nor is comprehended by it. Partible souls, however, accede to bodies, and give themselves up to them.”
Conformably to this Porphyry also, in his Αφορμαι προς τα νοητα, No. 30, says, “No whole and perfect essence is converted to its own progeny; but all perfect natures are led back to the causes by which they were generated, even as far as to the mundane body. For this body, being perfect, is elevated to the mundane soul which is intellectual, and through this is circularly moved. But the soul of this body is elevated to intellect, and intellect to that which is first. All things, therefore, extend themselves to this, beginning from that which is last, according to the peculiar ability of each. But the reduction to that which is first is either proximate or remote. Hence these are not only said to aspire after divinity, but also to enjoy him as far as they are able. But in partial natures, and which are able to verge to many things, a conversion to their progeny belongs. Hence in these guilt, in these disgraceful perfidy, is found. Matter, therefore, defiles these, because they decline to it, at the same time that they possess the power of converting themselves to a divine nature.”
[95]. Iamblichus here alludes to the excellent treatise of Porphyry, περι της των εμψυχων αποχης, On Abstinence from Animal Food, from which work the English reader will find several admirable extracts in one of the Introductory Dissertations prefixed to my translation of Proclus on Euclid.
[96]. A celestial body, as is beautifully shown by Proclus in Tim. lib. iii. contains the summits of all the elements, but is characterized by vivific unburning fire; so that, in short, it is vitalized extension.
[97]. The number sixty is no less manifest in the crocodile than in the sun. For according to Aristotle (in Hist. Anim. lib. v.) the crocodile brings forth sixty eggs of a white colour and sits on them for sixty days.
[98]. “Isis,” says Gale, “is the moon. And a dog attended Isis when she was diligently seeking her husband Osiris. But the moon perpetually seeks the sun, and therefore that sagacious animal, the dog, accords with Isis. In the solemnities, also, of Isis, dogs preceded the procession.” After this manner others besides Gale; who have not penetrated the depths of the philosophy and theology of Plato, would doubtless explain what is fabulously said of Isis. In reality, however, Isis is not the moon, but one of the divinities that revolve in the lunar sphere as an attendant on the moon, and who, in modern language, is one of the satellites of that planet. For, as I have shown from Proclus, in the Introduction to my translation of the Timæus of Plato, every planetary sphere is an ολοτης, or a part of the universe having a total subsistence, i. e. ranking as a whole, and is surrounded with a number of satellites analogous to the choir of the fixed stars. Of these satellites, likewise, the leaders of which are the planets, the first in order are Gods; after these, dæmons revolve in lucid orbicular bodies; and these are followed by partial souls, such as ours. See Proclus in Tim. p. 275 and p. 279· This theory, as I have elsewhere observed, is the grand key to the theology and mythology of the ancients, as it shows at one view why the same God is so often celebrated with the names of other Gods; which induced Macrobius to think that all the Gods were nothing more than different powers of the sun. The English reader will find an abundant confirmation of what is here said in the fourth book of my translation of the above mentioned admirable work of Proclus.
[99]. “The Egyptians,” says Horapollo, lib. i. “wishing to signify the moon, paint a cynocephalus, because this animal is variously affected by the course of the moon.”
[100]. In the original μυγαλη. “This word,” says Gale, “is written variously, viz. as μυγάλη, μυγαλὴ, and μυγαλῆ. It is also variously translated, for it is either rattus, or mus araneus.” Plutarch, in the fourth book of his Symposiacs, Quest. 5, says, “that the Egyptians were of opinion that darkness was prior to light, and that the latter was produced from mice in the fifth generation, at the time of the new moon. And further still, they assert that the liver of the weasel diminishes in the wane of the moon.”
[101]. With the Egyptians many animals were sacred; for the worship of which the following admirable apology is made by Plutarch in his treatise of Isis and Osiris:
“It now remains that we should speak of the utility of these animals to man, and of their symbolical meaning; some of them partaking of one of these only, but many of them of both. It is evident, therefore, that the Egyptians worshiped the ox, the sheep, and the ichneumon, on account of their use and benefit, as the Lemnians did larks, for discovering the eggs of caterpillars and breaking them; and the Thessalians storks, because, as their land produced abundance of serpents, the storks destroyed all of them as soon as they appeared. Hence, also, they enacted a law, that whoever killed a stork should be banished. But the Egyptians honoured the asp, the weasel, and the beetle, in consequence of observing in them certain dark resemblances of the power of the Gods, like that of the sun in drops of water. For at present, many believe and assert that the weasel engenders by the ear, and brings forth by the mouth, being thus an image of the generation of reason [or the productive principle of things]. But the genus of beetles has no female; and all the males emit their sperm into a sphericle piece of earth, which they roll about, thrusting it backwards with their hind feet, while they themselves move forward; just as the sun appears to revolve in a direction contrary to that of the heavens, in consequence of moving from west to east. They also assimilated the asp to a star, as being exempt from old age, and performing its motions, unassisted by organs, with agility and ease. Nor was the crocodile honoured by them without a probable cause; but is said to have been considered by them as a resemblance of divinity, as being the only animal that is without a tongue. For the divine reason is unindigent of voice, and proceeding through a silent path, and accompanied with[[102]] justice, conducts mortal affairs according to it. They also say it is the only animal living in water that has the sight of its eyes covered with a thin and transparent film, which descends from his forehead, so that he sees without being seen, which is likewise the case with the first God. But in whatever place the female crocodile may lay her eggs, this may with certainty be concluded to be the boundary of the increase of the Nile. For not being able to lay their eggs in the water, and fearing to lay them far from it, they have such an accurate presensation of futurity, that though they enjoy the benefit of the river in its access, during the time of their laying and hatching, yet they preserve their eggs dry and untouched by the water. They also lay sixty eggs, are the same number of days in hatching them, and those that are the longest lived among them live just so many years, which number is the first of the measures employed by those who are conversant with the heavenly bodies.
“Moreover, of those animals that were honoured for both reasons, we have before spoken of the dog. But the ibis, killing indeed all deadly reptiles, was the first that taught men the use of medical evacuation, in consequence of observing that she is after this manner washed and purified by herself. Those priests, also, that are most attentive to the laws of sacred rites, when they consecrate water for lustration, fetch it from that place where the ibis had been drinking; for she will neither drink nor come near unwholesome or infected water; but with the distance of her feet from each other and her bill she makes an equilateral triangle. Farther still, the variety and mixture of her black wings about the white represents the moon when she is gibbous.
“We ought not, however, to wonder if the Egyptians love such slender similitudes, since the Greeks also, both in their pictures and statues, employ many such like resemblances of the Gods. Thus in Crete there was a statue of Jupiter without ears. For it is fit that he who is the ruler and lord of all things should hear no one.[[103]] Phidias also placed a dragon by the statue of Minerva, and a snail by that of Venus at Elis, to show that virgins require a guard, and that keeping at home and silence become married women. But the trident of Neptune is a symbol of the third region of the world, which the sea possesses, having an arrangement after the heavens and the air. Hence, also, they thus denominated Amphitrite and the Tritons. The Pythagoreans, likewise, adorned numbers and figures with the appellations of the Gods. For they called the equilateral triangle, Minerva Coryphagenes, or begotten from the summit, and Tritogeneia because it is divided by three perpendiculars drawn from the three angles. But they called the one Apollo, being persuaded to this by the obvious meaning of the word Apollo [which signifies a privation of multitude] and by the simplicity of the monad[[104]]. The duad they denominated strife and audacity, and the triad justice. For since injuring and being injured are two extremes subsisting according to excess and defect, justice, through equality, has a situation in the middle. But what is called the tetractys, being the number 36, was, as is reported, their greatest oath, and was denominated the world. For this number is formed from the composition of the four first even and the four first odd numbers, collected into one sum.[[105]] If, therefore, the most approved of the philosophers did not think it proper to neglect or despise any occult signification of a divine nature when they perceived it even in things which are inanimate and incorporeal, it appears to me that they, in a still greater degree, venerated those peculiarities depending on manners which they saw in such natures as had sense, and were endued with soul, with passion, and ethical habits. We must embrace, therefore, not those who honour these things, but those who reverence divinity through these, as through most clear mirrors, and which are produced by nature, in a becoming manner, conceiving them to be the instruments or the art of the God by whom all things are perpetually adorned. But we ought to think that no inanimate being can be more excellent than one that is animated, nor an insensible than a sensitive being, not even though some one should collect together all the gold and emeralds in the universe. For the divinity is not ingenerated either in colours, or figures, or smoothness; but such things as neither ever did, nor are naturally adapted to participate of life, have an allotment more ignoble than that of dead bodies. But the nature which lives and sees, and has the principle of motion from itself, and a knowledge of things appropriate and foreign to its being, has certainly derived an efflux and portion of that wisdom which, as Heraclitus says, considers how both itself and the universe is governed. Hence the divinity is not worse represented in these animals than in the workmanships of copper and stone, which in a similar manner suffer corruption and decay, but are naturally deprived of all sense and consciousness. This then I consider as the best defence that can be given of the adoration of animals by the Egyptians.”
[102]. Instead of και δικης, I read και μετα δικης.
[103]. i. e. Should be perfectly impartial.
[104]. Instead of διπλοτατοις μοναδος as in the original, which is nonsense, it is necessary to read, as in the above translation, απλοτητι της μοναδος.
[105]. For 2 + 4 + 6 + 8 = 20; and 1 + 3 + 6 + 7 = 16; and 20 + 16 = 36.
[106]. The cock was sacred to Apollo, and therefore its heart was believed to be the instrument of divination in sacrifices. The chemic Olympiodorus says, “that the cock obscurely signifies the essence of the sun and moon.” See, in the additional notes, what is said by Proclus concerning the cock, in his treatise On Magic.
[107]. It is well observed by Ficinus, in lib. i. Eunead. ii. Plotin. “that the fire which is enkindled by us is more similar to the heavens than other terrestrial substances. Hence it participates of light, which is something incorporeal, is the most powerful of all things, is as it were vital, is perpetually moved, divides all things, without being itself divided, absorbs all things in itself, and avoids any foreign mixture: and lastly, when the fuel of it is consumed, it suddenly flies back again to the celestial fire, which is every where latent.”
[108]. For this vehicle is luciform, and consists of pure, immaterial, unburning, and vivific fire. See the fifth book of my translation of Proclus on the Timæus.
[109]. Proclus in Tim. lib. v. observes concerning the telestic art, or the art which operates through mystic ceremonies, “that, as the oracles teach, it obliterates through divine fire all the stains produced by generation.” Η τελεστικη δια του θειου πυρος αφανιζει τας εκ της γενεσεως απασας κηλιδας, ως τα λογια διδασκει. Hence another Chaldean oracle says, τῳ πυρι γαρ βροτος εμπελασας θεοθεν φαος εξει. i. e. “The mortal who approaches to fire will have a light from divinity.” Hercules, as we also learn from Proclus, was an example of this telestic purification. For he says, Ηρακλης δια τελεστικης καθῃραμενος, και των αχραντων καρπων μετασχων, τελειας ετυχε εις τους θεους αποκαταστασεως, in Plat. Polit. p. 382. i. e. “Hercules being purified through the telestic art, and participating of undefiled fruits, obtained a perfect restoration to the Gods.”
[110]. In the original, λεγω δε της θειας ψυχης τε και φυσεως, αλλ’ ουχι της περικοσμιου τε και γενεσιουργου. But it appears to me that we should here read, conformably to the above translation, λεγω δε της θειας, ψυχης τε και ψυσεως, αλλ’ ουχι μονου της περικοσμιου τε και γενεσιουργου.
[111]. These media consist of the order of Gods denominated αρχαι, or rulers, and of those called απολυτοι, or liberated; the former of which also are denominated supermundane, and the latter supercelestial, in consequence of existing immediately above the celestial Gods. See, concerning these media, the sixth book of my translation of Proclus on the Theology of Plato.
[112]. Proclus on the First Alcibiades observes, “that about every God there is an innumerable multitude of dæmons, who have the same appellations with their leaders. And that these are delighted when they are called by the names of Apollo or Jupiter, because they express in themselves the characteristic peculiarity of their leading Gods.” In the same admirable commentary, also, he says, “that in the most holy of the mysteries [i. e. in the Eleusinian mysteries], prior to the appearance of divinity, the incursions of certain terrestrial dæmons present themselves to the view, alluring the souls of the spectators from undefiled good to matter.”
[113]. It is beautifully observed by Simplicius on Epictetus, “that as if you take away letters from a sentence, or change them, the form of the sentence no longer remains, thus also in divine works or words, if any thing is deficient, or is changed, or is confused, divine illumination does not take place, but the indolence of him who does this dissolves the power of what is effected.” Ωσπερ γαρ εαν στοιχεια του λογου αφελῃς, ἢ υπαλλαξης, ουκ επιγινεται το του λογου ειδος, ουτω και των θειων εργων ἢ λογων ει ελλειπει τι, ἢ υπηλλακται, ἢ συγκεχυται, ουκ επιγινεται η του θειου ελλαμψις, αλλα και εξυδαροι την των γινομενων δυναμιν η του ποιουντος ραθυμια.
[114]. Conformably to this, Servius, in his Annotations on the words
Diique, deæque omnes—
in the sixth book of the Æneid observes, “more pontificum, per quos ritu veteri in omnibus sacris post speciales Deos, quos ad ipsum sacrum, quod fiebat necesse erat invocari, generaliter omnia numina invocabantur.” i. e. “This is spoken after the manner of the pontiffs, by whom, according to ancient rites, in all sacrifices, after the appropriate Gods whom it was necessary to invoke to the sacrifice, all the divinities were invoked in general.” And in his Annotations on the seventh of the Æneid he informs us, “that king Œneus offered a sacrifice of first fruits to all the divinities but Diana, who being enraged sent a boar [as a punishment for the neglect].” With respect to this anger, however, of Diana, it is necessary to observe with Proclus, “that the anger of the Gods does not refer any passion to them, but indicates our inaptitude to participate of them.” Ο γαρ των θεων χολος, ουκ εις εκεινας αναπεμπει τι παθος, αλλα την ημων δεικνυσι ανεπιτηδειοτητα της εκεινων μεθεξεως.
[115]. Plotinus was a man of this description, to whom, most probably, Iamblichus alludes in what he now says.
[116]. In the original θυμον τινος: but it is doubtless requisite to read with Gale, θεσμον τινος. This I have translated a certain divine legislation, because we are informed by Proclus, in Platon. Theol. lib. iv. p. 206, “that θεσμος is connected with deity, and pertains more to intelligibles; but that νομος, which unfolds intellectual distribution, is adapted to the intellectual fathers.” Ο γαρ θεσμος συμπλεκεται τῳ θεῳ, και προσηκει μαλλον τοις νοητοις ο δε νομος την νοεραν εμφαινων διανομην, οικειος εσι τοις νοεροις πατρασι.
[117]. “Perhaps,” says Proclus, in MS. Comment, in Parmenid. “it is necessary that, as in souls, natures, and bodies, fabrication does not begin from the imperfect; so likewise in matter, prior to that which is formless, and which has an evanescent being, there is that which is in a certain respect form, and which is beheld in one boundary and permanency.” This, therefore, will be the pure and divine matter of which Iamblichus is now speaking. Damascius also says, that matter is from the same order whence form is derived.
[118]. This particular respecting the apples of gold is added from the version of Scutellius, who appears to have translated this work from a more perfect manuscript than that which was used by Gale.
[119]. The conjecture of Gale, that for ἢ το εν Αβυδῳ in this place, we should read ἢ το εν αδυτῳ, is, I have no doubt, right. For the highest order of intelligibles is denominated by Orpheus the adytum, as we are informed by Proclus in Tim. By the arcanum in the adytum, therefore, is meant the deity who subsists at the extremity of the intelligible order (i. e. Phanes); and of whom it is said in the Chaldean Oracles, “that he remains in the paternal profundity, and in the adytum, near to the god-nourished silence.”
[120]. For εις το φαινομενον και ορφμενον σωμα, I read εις το φερομενον κ. τ. λ.
[121]. Here too for Αβυδῳ I read αδυτῳ.
[122]. Conformably to this, Martianus Capella also, in lib. ii. De Nuptiis Philol. &c. speaking of the sun, says, “Ibi quandam navim, totius naturæ cursus diversa cupiditate moderantem, cunctaque flammarum congestione plenissimam, et beatis circumactam mercibus conspicatur. Cui nautæ septem, germani tamen, suique similes præsidebant in prora. Præsidebat in prora felis forma depicta, leonis in arbore, crocodili in extimo.” For these animals, the cat, the lion, and the crocodile were peculiarly sacred to the sun. Martianus adds, “In eadem vero rate, fons quidem lucis æthereæ, arcanisque fluoribus manans, in totius mundi lumina fundebatur.” i. e. “In the same ship there was a fountain of etherial light flowing with arcane streams, which were poured into all the luminaries of the world.” Porphyry, likewise, in his treatise De Antro Nymph. says, “that the Egyptians placed the sun and all dæmons not connected with any thing solid or stable, but raised on a sailing vessel.”
[123]. In the original παν ζωδιον, which Gale erroneously translates animalia omnia.
[124]. Of this kind are the following names in Alexand. Trallian. lib. ii. Μευ, Θρευ, Μορ, Φορ, Τευξ, Ζα, Ζων, Θε, Λου, Χρι, Γε, Ζε, Ων, i.e. Meu, Threu, Mor, Phor, Teux, Za, Zōn, The, Lou, Chri, Ge, Ze, Ōn. By these names Alexander Trallianus says, the sun becomes fixed in the heavens. He adds, “Again behold the great name Ιαξ, (lege Ιαω), Αζυφ, Ζυων, Θρευξ, Βαϊν, Χωωκ, i. e. Iaō, Azuph, Zuōn, Threux, Baïn, Chōōk.” Among the Latins, also, Cato, Varro, and Marcellus de Medicamentis Empiricis, there are examples of these names; the power and efficacy of which, as Gale observes, are testified by history, though it is not easy to explain the reason of their operation.
[125]. Proclus, in commenting on the following words of Plato in the Timæus, (see vol. i. p. 228, of my translation of his Commentary), viz. “Let, therefore, this universe be denominated by us all heaven, or the world, or whatever other appellation it may be especially adapted to receive,” beautifully thus observes concerning the divine name of the world. “As of statues established by the telestic art, some things pertaining to them are manifest, but others are inwardly concealed, being symbolical of the presence of the Gods, and which are only known to the mystic artists themselves; after the same manner, the world being a statue of the intelligible, and perfected by the father, has indeed some things which are visible indications of its divinity; but others, which are the invisible impressions of the participation of being received by it from the father, who gave it perfection, in order that through these it may be eternally rooted in real being. Heaven, indeed, and the world are names significant of the powers in the universe; the latter, so far as it proceeds from the intelligible; but the former, so far as it is converted to it. It is, however, necessary to know that the divine name of its abiding power, and which is a symbol of the impression of the Demiurgus, according to which it does not proceed out of being, is ineffable and arcane, and known only to the Gods themselves. For there are names adapted to every order of things; those, indeed, that are adapted to divine natures being divine, to the objects of dianoia being dianoetic, and to the objects of opinion doxastic. This also Plato says in the Cratylus, where he embraces what is asserted by Homer on this subject, who admits that names of the same things are with the Gods different from those that subsist in the opinions of men,
Xanthus by God, by men Scamander call’d
Iliad xx. v. 74.
And,
Which the Gods Chalcis, men Cymindis call.
Iliad xiv. v. 291.
And in a similar manner in many other names. For as the knowledge of the Gods is different from that of partial souls, thus also the names of the one are different from those of the other; since divine names unfold the whole essence of the things named, but those of men only partially come into contact with them. Plato, therefore, knowing that this preexisted in the world, omits the divine and ineffable name itself, which is different from the apparent name, and with the greatest caution introduces it as a symbol of the divine impression which the world contains. For the words, “or whatever other appellation” and “it may receive” are a latent hymn of the mundane name, as ineffable, and as allotted a divine essence, in order that it may be coordinate to what is signified by it. Hence, also, divine mundane names are delivered by Theurgists; some of which are called by them ineffable, but others effable; and some being significant of the invisible powers in the world, but others of the visible elements from which it derives its completion. Through these causes, therefore, as hypotheses, the mundane form, the demiurgic cause and paradigm, and the apparent and unapparent name of the world are delivered. And the former name, indeed, is dyadic, but the latter monadic. For the words “whatever other” are significant of oneness. You may also consider the ineffable name of the universe as significant of its abiding in the father; but the name world, as indicative of its progression; and heaven of its conversion. But through the three, you have the final cause, on account of which it is full of good; abiding ineffably, proceeding perfectly, and converting itself to the good as the antecedent object of desire.”
[126]. See the additional notes at the end of vol. v. of my translation of Plato, where many of these names are beautifully unfolded from the MS. Scholia of Proclus on the Cratylus.
[127]. See the additional notes at the end of vol. v. of my translation of Plato, and also the notes to my translation of Aristotle de Interpretatione, in which the reader will find a treasury of recondite information concerning names, from Proclus and Ammonius.
[128]. Most historians give the palm of antiquity to the Egyptians. And Lucian, in lib. De Syria Dea, says, “that the Egyptians are said to be the first among men that had a conception of the Gods, and a knowledge of sacred concerns.——They were also the first that had a knowledge of sacred names.” Αιγυπτιοι πρωτοι ανθρωπων λεγονται θεων τε εννοιην λαβειν και ιρα εισασθαι——πρωτοι δε και ονοματα ιρα εγνωσαν. Conformably to this, also, an oracle of Apollo, quoted by Eusebius, says that the Egyptians were the first that disclosed by infinite actions the path that leads to the Gods. This oracle is as follows:
Αιπεινη γαρ οδος, μακαρων, τρηχειατε πολλον,
Χαλκοδετοις τα πρωτα διοιγομενη πυλεωσιν.
Ατραπιτοι δε εασσιν αθεσφατοι εγγεγαυιαι
Ας πρωτοι μεροπων επ’ απειρονα πρηξιν εφηναν,
Οι το καλον πινοντες υδωρ Νειλωτιδος αιης·
Πολλας και Φοινικες οδους μακαρων εδαησαν,
Ασσυριοι, Λυδοιτε, και Εβραιων (lege Χαλδαιων) γενος ανδρων.
i.e. “The path by which to deity we climb,
Is arduous, rough, ineffable, sublime;
And the strong massy gates, through which we pass
In our first course, are bound with chains of brass.
Those men the first who of Egyptian birth
Drank the fair water of Nilotic earth,
Disclosed by actions infinite this road,
And many paths to God Phœnicians show’d.
This road th’ Assyrians pointed out to view,
And this the Lydians and Chaldeans knew.”
For Εβραιων in this oracle I read Χαλδαιων, because I have no doubt that either Aristobulus the Jew, well known for interpolating the writings of the Heathens, or the wicked Eusebius as he is called by the Emperor Julian, have fraudulently substituted the former word for the latter.
[129]. Prayers of this kind are such as those of which Proclus speaks in Tim. p. 65, when he says, “The cathartic prayer is that which is offered for the purpose of averting diseases originating from pestilence, and other contagious distempers, such as we have written in our temples.” Καθαρτικαι δε (ευχαἰ, επι αποτροπαις λοιμικων νοσημοτων, ἢ παντοιων μολυσμων’ οιας δε και εν τοις ιεροις εχομεν αναγεγραμμενας.
[130]. Porphyry, in lib. ii. De Abstinentia, mentions Seleucus the theologist, and Suidas says that Seleucus the Alexandrian wrote 100 books concerning the Gods.
[131]. These books (βιβλοι) were most probably nothing more than short discourses, such as the treatises now are which are circulated as written by Hermes, and which, as Iamblichus informs us, contain Hermaic doctrines.
[132]. A great priest, a scribe of the Adyta in Egypt, by birth a Sebanite, and an inhabitant of Heliopolis, as he relates of himself.
[133]. In the original, πρωτος και του πρωτου θεου και βασιλεως, which Gale translates, prior etiam primo Deo, et rege [sole]. But the addition of sole in his translation is obviously most unappropriate and false: for Iamblichus is evidently speaking of a deity much superior to the sun.
[134]. For Ημηφ here, Gale conjectures that we should read Κνηφ Kneph: for Plutarch says that the unbegotten Kneph was celebrated with an extraordinary degree of veneration by the Egyptian Thebans.
[135]. Hence the moon is said by Proclus to be αυτοπτον της φυσεως αγαλμα, the self-visible statue or image of nature.
[136]. Proclus in Tim. p. 117, cites what is here said as the doctrine of the Egyptians, and also cites for it the authority of Iamblichus. But his words are, και μην και η των Αιγυπτιων παραδοσις τα αυτα περι αυτης (της υλης) φησιν. ο γε τοι θειος Ιαμβλιχος ιστορησεν οτι και Ερμης εκ της ουσιοτητος την υλοτητα παραγεσθαι βουλεται., i. e. “Moreover the doctrine of the Egyptians asserts the same things concerning matter. For the divine Iamblichus relates that Hermes also produces matter from essentiality.”
[137]. This is most probably the Chæremon who is said by Porphyry, in lib. iv. De Abstinentia, “to be a lover of truth, an accurate writer, and very conversant with the Stoic philosophy.” Τοιαυτα μεν τα κατ’ Αιγυπτιους υπ’ ανδρος φιλαληθους τε και ακριβους, εντε τοις Στωϊκοις πραγματικωτατα φιλοσοφησαντος μεμαρτυρημενα.
[138]. This was the ninth king in the twenty-sixth dynasty of the Saitan kings.
[139]. This city is mentioned by Plato in the Timæus, who represents Critias as saying “that there is a certain region of Egypt, called Delta, about the summit of which the streams of the Nile are divided, and in which there is a province called Saitical.” He adds, “of this province the greatest city is Saïs, from which also King Amasis derived his origin. The city has a presiding divinity, whose name is, in the Egyptian tongue, Neith, but in the Greek Athena, or Minerva.” It is singular that Gale, who is not deficient in philology, though but a smatterer in philosophy, should have omitted to remark in his notes this passage of Plato.
[140]. Proclus, in MS. Comment, in Alcibiad. cites one of the Chaldean oracles, which says,
——πορθμιον ουνομα το δ’ εν απειροις
Κοσμοις ενθρωσκον.
i. e. “There is a transmitting name which leaps into the infinite worlds.” And in his MS. Scholia in Cratyl. he quotes another of these oracles, viz.
Αλλα εστιν ουνομα σεμνον ακοιμητῳ στροφαλιγγι,
Κοσμοις ενθρωσκον, κραιπνην δια πατρος ενιπην.
i. e. “There is a venerable name with a sleepless revolution, leaping into the worlds through the rapid reproofs of the father.”
[141]. For εχεται in this place, I read περιεχεται.
[142]. Gale, in his translation of this part, has entirely mistaken the meaning of Iamblichus, which he frequently does in other places. For the words of Iamblichus are, οταν γαρ δη τα βελτιονα των εν ημιν ενεργῃ, και προς τα κρειττονα αναγεται αυτης η ψυχη; and the version of Gale is “quando enim pars nostri melior operari incipiat, et ad sui portionem meliorem recolligatur anima.” For τα κρειττονα is not the better part of the soul; but when the better parts of the soul energize, the soul is then intimately converted to itself, and through this conversion is elevated to superior natures.
[143]. Viz. The science of calculating nativities.
[144]. i. e. The joint risings and settings.
[145]. i. e. Through a period of 300,000 years; and Procl. in Tim. lib. iv. p. 277, informs us that the Chaldeans had observations of the stars which embraced whole mundane periods. What Proclus likewise asserts of the Chaldeans is confirmed by Cicero in his first book on Divination, who says that they had records of the stars for the space of 370,000 years; and by Diodorus Siculus, Bibl. lib. xi. p. 118, who says that their observations comprehended the space of 473,000 years.
[146]. “We say,” says Hephestion, “that a star is the lord of the geniture, which has five conditions of the lord of the nativity in the horoscope; viz. if that star receives the luminaries in their proper boundaries, in their proper house, in their proper altitude, and in the proper triangle.” He also adds, “and if besides it has contact, effluxion, and configuration.” See likewise Porphyry in Ptolemæum, p. 191.
[147]. According to the Egyptians every one received his proper dæmon at the hour of his birth; nor did they ascend any higher, in order to obtain a knowledge of it. For they alone considered the horoscope. See Porphyry apud Stobæum, p. 201, and Hermes in Revolut. cap. iv.
[148]. In the original ενταυθα δε ουν και η της αληθειας παρεστι θεα, και η της νοερας επιστημης. But instead of η της νοερας απιστημης, which appears to me to be defective, I read η κτησις της νοερας επιστημης.
[149]. For θεωτος here, I read θεωτερος.
[150]. In the original, by a strange mistake, των θνητων is inserted here instead of των νοητων, which is obviously the true reading. The version of Gale also has intelligibilium.
[151]. i. e. Man, considered as a rational soul, connected with the irrational life; for this man has dominion in the realms of generation.
[152]. See the second edition of this work in Nos. XV. and XVI. of the Pamphleteer.
[153]. i. e. Of natures which are not connected with body.
[154]. For in these, all are in each, but not all in all.
[155]. By an unaccountable mistake here του σωματος is inserted instead of της ψυχης; but the mistake is not noticed by the German editor of these Scholia.
[156]. And in consequence of this mistake, for αυτο in this place, we must read αυτα.
[157]. Odyss. xi. 612.
[158]. Iliad xv. 605.
[159]. For μουσικης here, it is necessary to read μαντικης.
[160]. And for μαντικην read μαντικη.
[161]. For υπο here, it is necessary to read υπερ.
[162]. The German editor of these Scholia, instead of πρακτικῃ which is the true reading in this place, and which he found in the manuscript, absurdly substitutes for it πυκτικῃ, as if Hercules was a pugilist. See my translation of the Dissertation at Maximus Tyrius, on the Practic and Theoretic Life.
[163]. Vid. Olympiodor. in Aristot. Meteor.
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