[437] Plato, Legg, xi. p. 934 D.
Hurt or damage, not deadly, done by one man to another. — Plato enumerates two different modes of inflicting damage:— 1. By drugs (applied externally or internally), magic, or sorcery. 2. By theft or force.[438]
[438] Plato, Legg. xi. p. 932 E-933 E. Both these come under the general head ὅσα τις ἄλλος ἄλλον πημαίνει.
Poison — Magic — Incantations — Severe punishment.
As to the first mode, if the drug be administered by a physician, he must be put to death: if by one not a physician, the Dikasts will determine the nature of his punishment. And in the case of magical arts, or incantations, if the person who resorts to them be a prophet, or an inspector of prodigies, he must be put to death: another person doing the same will be punished at the discretion of the Dikasts. Here we see that the prophet is ranked as a professional person (the like appears in Homer) along with the physician,[439] — who must know what he is about, while another person perhaps may not know. But Plato’s own opinion respecting magical incantations is delivered with singular reserve. He will neither avouch them nor reject them. He intimates that a man can hardly find out what is true on the subject; and even if he could, it would be harder still to convince others. Most men are in serious alarm when they see waxen statuettes hung at their doors or at their family tombs; and it is useless to attempt to tranquillise them by reminding them that they have no certain evidence on the subject.[440] Here we see how Plato discourages the received legends and the current faith, when he believes them to be hurtful — as contrasted with his vehemence in upholding them when he thinks them useful: as in the case of the paternal curse, and the judgments of the Gods. The question of their truth is made to depend on their usefulness.[441] The Gods are made to act exactly as he thinks they ought to act. They are not merely invoked, but positively counted on, as executioners of Plato’s ethical sentences.
[439] Plato, Legg. xi. p. 933 C. ὡς πρῶτον μὲν τὸν ἐπιχειροῦντα φαρμάττειν οὐκ εἰδότα τί δρᾷ, τά τε κατὰ σώματα, ἐὰν μὴ τυγχάνῃ ἐπιστήμων ὢν ἰατρικῆς, τά τε αὖ περὶ τὰ μαγγανεύματα, ἐὰν μὴ μάντις ἢ τερατοσκόπος ὢν τυγχάνῃ.
Homer, Odys. xvii. 383:—
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… τῶν οἳ δημιοεργοὶ ἔασι, μάντιν, ἢ ἰήτηρα κακῶν, ἢ τέκτονα δούρων, ἢ καὶ θέσπιν ἀοιδόν, &c. |
[440] Plato, Legg. xi. p. 933 B. ἄν ποτε ἴδωσί που κήρινα μιμήματα πεπλασμένα. Compare Theokritus, Idyll, ii. 28-59.
See the remarkable narrative of the death of Germanicus in Syria, supposed to have been brought about by the magical artifices wrought under the auspices of Piso (Tacitus, Ann. ii. 69).