The obstacles to a virtuous life are, however, confessedly numberless, and, humanly speaking, insurmountable. To raise one's self above the clamor of passion, the power of evil, the bondage of the flesh, is acknowledged, in mournful language, to be a hopeless task. A cloud of sadness shades the brow of Plato as he contemplates the fallen state of man. In the "Phædrus" he describes, in gorgeous imagery, the purity, and beauty, and felicity of the soul in its anterior and primeval state, when, charioteering through the highest arch of heaven in company with the Deity, it contemplated the divine justice and beauty; but "this happy life," says he, "we forfeited by our transgression." Allured by strange affections, our souls forgot the sacred things that we were made to contemplate and love--we fell. And now, in our fallen state, the soul has lost its pristine beauty and excellence. It has become more disfigured than was Glaucus, the seaman "whose primitive form was not recognizable, so disfigured had he become by his long dwelling in the sea." [960] To restore this lost image of the good,--to regain "this primitive form," is not the work of man, but God. Man can not save himself. "Virtue is not natural to man, neither is it to be learned, but it comes by a divine influence. Virtue, is the gift of God." [961] He needs a discipline, "an education which is divine." If he is saved from the common wreck, it must be "by the special favor of Heaven." [962] He must be delivered from sin, if ever delivered, by the interposition of God.
[Footnote 960: ][ (return) ] "Republic," bk. x. ch. xi.
[Footnote 961: ][ (return) ] "Meno."
[Footnote 962: ][ (return) ] "Republic," bk. vi. ch. vi., vii.
Plato was, in some way, able to discover the need of a Saviour, to desire a Saviour, but he could not predict his appearing. Hints are obscurely given of a Conqueror of sin, an Assuager of pain, an Averter of evil in this life, and of the impending retributions of the future life; but they are exceedingly indefinite and shadowy. In all instances they are rather the language of desire, than of hope. Platonism awakened in the heart of humanity a consciousness of sin and a profound feeling of want--the want of a Redeemer from sin, a spiritual, a divine Remedy for its moral malady--and it strove after some remedial power. But it was equally conscious of failure and defeat. It could enlighten the reason, but it could only act imperfectly on the will. Platonic was a striking counterpart to Pauline experience prior to the apostle's deliverance by the power and grace of Christ. It discovered that "the Law is holy, and the commandment is holy, and just, and good." It recognized that "it is spiritual, but man is carnal, the slave of sin." It could say, "What I do I approve not; for I do not what I would, but what I hate. But if my will [my better judgment] is against what I do, I consent unto the Law that it is good. And now it is no more I that do it, but sin, that dwelleth in me. For I know that in me, that is, in my flesh, good abideth not, for to will is present with me, but the power to do the right is absent: the good that I would, I do not; but the evil that I would not, that I do. I consent gladly to the law of God in my inner man ['the rational and immortal nature' [963]; but I behold a law in my members ['the irascible and concupiscible nature' [964] warring against the law of my mind (or reason), and bringing me into captivity to the law of sin which is in my members. Oh wretched man that I am! who shall deliver me from the body of this death?" [965] Paul was able to say, "I thank God (that he hath now delivered me), through Jesus Christ our Lord!" Platonism could only desire, and hope, and wait for the coming of a Deliverer.
[Footnote 963: ][ (return) ] Plato.
[Footnote 965: ][ (return) ] Romans, vii.
This consciousness of the need of supernatural light and help, and this aspiration after a light supernatural and divine, which Plato inherited from Socrates, constrained him to regard with toleration, and even reverence, every apparent approach, every pretension, even, to a divine inspiration and guidance in the age in which he lived. "'The greatest blessings which men receive come through the operation of phrensy (µανία--inspired exaltation), when phrensy is the gift of God. The prophetess of Delphi, and the priestess of Dodona, many are the benefits which in their phrensies (moments of inspiration) they have bestowed upon Greece; but in their hours of self-possession, few or none. And too long were it to speak of the Sibyl, and others, who, inspired and prophetic, have delivered utterances beneficial to the hearers. Indeed, this word phrenetic or maniac is no reproach; it is identical with mantic --prophetic. [966] And often when diseases and plagues have fallen upon men for the sins of their forefathers, some phrensy too has broken forth, and in prophetic strain has pointed out a remedy, showing how the sin might be expiated, and the gods appeased (by prayers, and purifications, and atoning rites).... So many and yet more great effects could I tell you of the phrensy which comes from the gods." [967] Some have discerned in all this merely the food for a feeble ridicule. They regard these sentiments as simply an evidence of the power and prevalence of superstition clouding the loftiest intellects in ancient times. By the more thoughtful and philosophic mind, however, they will be accepted as an indication of the imperishable and universal faith of humanity in a supernatural and supersensuous world, and in the possibility of some communication between heaven and earth. [968] And above all, it is a conclusive proof that Plato believed that the knowledge of salvation--of a remedy for sin, a method of expiation for sin, a means of deliverance from the power and punishment of sin, must be revealed from Heaven.
[Footnote 966: ][ (return) ] [Mανία], phrensy; [µάντις], a prophet--one who utters oracles in a state of divine phrensy; [µαντική], the prophetic art.